Hijack victim in coma after being dragged
A PARKHURST man is in a coma after he was run over by a hijacker’s getaway car and dragged for 40 metres.
Vagrants and bystanders on the Parkhurst street had to lift the car off the man so he could be pulled to safety.
The man, who his family don’t want named, has had two operations in two days and is scheduled for a third on Monday. This as he remains in a medically-induced coma.
His wife, Christelle Weale, said the two of them had fought off the hijackers on Sunday afternoon before the getaway driver panicked.
“I don’t think they expected us to fight back,” said Weale.
She and her husband had turned into their driveway on Parkhurst Road, when a car appeared and blocked them.
Weale said three men dressed in black jumped out. Two approached her on the driver’s side, while the third went for her husband.
“My husband took the gun off the guy and it dropped, I pulled out a can of maze and the two guys just ran.”
But when Weale looked to see what was happening to her husband, she saw him on the ground. The driver of the getaway car, she believes, panicked and drove into him.
He proceeded to drive down the road, dragging Weale’s husband. The hijackers then shot at and stopped a neighbour’s Range Rover that had turned into the street. As this happened they continued firing.
“Every time I raised my head they would fire, I counted four bullet holes in the car.”
The four hijackers then drove off in the Range Rover, which was recovered later near Jan Smuts Avenue.
Weale said when she got to her husband he was pinned under the getaway car and his lips had turned blue. The car had to be lifted.
“I couldn’t feel his pulse, but 10 seconds later he spluttered and started breathing.”
When doctors got to examine Weale’s husband in hospital, they discovered that his injuries were extensive.
He had two punctured lungs, all his ribs were broken, his kidneys crushed, and his femur, patella, arm and pelvis broken. He also suffered third degree burns from the exhaust of the car.
But Weale believes it could have been a lot worse. “If the driver was armed, he would have shot him,” she said.
Police spokesperson Captain Tintswalo Sibeko said no arrests had been made.