Third ‘ambush’ victim dies
THE family of a Chatsworth mother and two children, who were shot and killed, are calling for swift police action and justice.
Charlene Naicker, 38, of Pond Street in Welbadact East, her children, Chazlyn, 2, and Ainzlee, 14, were allegedly ambushed in their home on February 11.
Chazlyn was shot three times in the chest and once in the head. She died en route to the hospital. Ainzlee, a Grade 7 pupil at the Durban School for the Hearing Impaired, was shot in the neck, head and hand. He died the next morning. The children’s funeral was on Saturday.
Naicker’s three other children, aged 11, 7, and 4, who were also at home at the time, were not injured. Her husband and eldest son, 20, were not home.
Naicker sustained gunshot wounds to the thigh and stomach and was in a critical condition in the intensive care unit at a local hospital.
She died on Monday.
Samantha Windvogel, Naicker’s sister, said: “We just buried her two children at the weekend, without her even knowing they had passed on. Now, we are making her funeral arrangements. We were praying for her recovery, especially for the sake of her other children, who are still so young. How will they live without their mother?
“We are all still in shock and emotional. I had to break the news to her other children and our mother, with whom she shared a close bond. My mother and sister lived next door to each other, and they spent every day together. They were best friends.”
Windvogel, a DA councillor, said her sister always found humour in the strangest of things.
“She was a good mother. Her children were her life. Whenever you picture or remember her, you will think of her in that mother role as she would always have her children by her side. The police now need to get to the bottom of this and take this case seriously.
“We want to know what really transpired and these perpetrators need to be brought to book. We can’t have these criminals out on the loose.”
Naicker’s funeral will be held on Thursday.
Lieutenant-Colonel Nqobile Gwala, a provincial police spokesperson, said murder charges were being investigated.
According to the latest police quarterly crime figures, 6 859 people were killed between October and December 2021. More than 900 were women, and around 350 were children.