Killer’s eldest daughter asks for clemency

ROB Packham’s eldest daughter pleaded with the Western Cape High Court not to send her father to jail forever.

Kerry Meyer, 28, testified in mitigation during sentencing proceedings yesterday.

“I just ask if you could not put him away forever,” she told the court.

Packham, 57, was found guilty of killing his wife Gill Packham, stuffing her body into the boot of her car and then setting the car alight on February 22 last year.

“It’s a difficult situation and I know that many people don’t understand, but he is still my father. I lost my mother. It’s something I don’t know how to put in words, I’m devastated… Her death has left a hole in my life, in everyone’s lives, including my father’s,” she said.

She described her father as a wonderful man who she had never seen acting violent or aggressive.

Meyer asked that the court take into consideration that she and her sister, Nicola Packham, 25, would like to have their father around one day so that he could play a part in their children’s lives.

Packham and his wife had been married for about 31 years. He confessed to having an affair with another woman in October 2017.

The deceased’s two sisters, Helen Humphrey and Roslynn Humphrey, wrote to the court detailing the impact the death has had on their lives.

Helen wrote: “We failed to help her see that it was okay to walk away from a marriage or relationship that was not good for he. We failed to help her see that there are always options. We failed to help her know we would do anything to help her.

“We are all victims of crime, even though it was Gill who paid the ultimate price.”

Roslynn said: “The suffering and pain she must have endured in the last hours of her life just make me cry each time I think about it.”

The case has been postponed for arguments on June 10.