Baby killer case waits on report

A BUNGLING social worker has secured a mother convicted of killing her newborn baby girl some more time outside prison.

Sentencing proceedings in the murder case against Zikhona Mndela, a young mother from Tembisa, could not begin yesterday due to the social worker’s failure to hand over her pre-sentence report.

This was the second time the start of sentencing proceedings in the matter of Mndela, out on bail that was extended after her conviction, had to be postponed.

They were first postponed in December. At the time, Judge Ratha Mokgoatlheng heard that the social worker’s report was still not ready.

The report would detail factors detailing whether Judge Mokgoatlheng should hand Mndela a minimum sentence for murder or deviate.

Advocate Sindisa Hlazo, Mndela’s lawyer, told the court yesterday that the social worker had informed him that the report was now done, but he was yet to receive it.

“She undertook to email the report to me, but she hasn’t,” Hlazo told Judge Mokgoatlheng.

Hlazo added that he had also asked the social worker to be present in court yesterday. She did not appear.

Mndela was found guilty on November 7 of birth concealment and murder. She gave birth on her own and placed the baby girl in a 20-litre paint tin, after wrapping her in plastic and a jacket.

Mndela did not inform her friends and ex-boyfriend (the father of the child and who took her to hospital) that she had given birth. She also tried to lie to a doctor.

Police who went with her to the home in which she gave birth found the child in the bucket, dead. Mndela testified that the baby fell on the floor when she squatted on the toilet.

Sentencing was postponed to March 20.