Court ruling little consolation to husband
“THERE will always be something missing, she just completed us.”
Orson Parsons was commenting after the guilty verdict handed down yesterday in the Durban High Court to Kerwin Christopher Houston and Darryl Murrison, who were on trial for the murder of his wife, Bianca Parsons, 32.
Parsons died after being shot in the back at a local garage in Wentworth, Durban, last February in what turned out to be a case of mistaken identity.
The court was packed with family and friends of the victim and the accused, with court officials having to bring in more seating before the hearing began.
Parsons said the verdict made him feel “both glad and sad at the same time”.
“Nothing will bring Bianca back,” he said, adding that he and his baby daughter faced a lifetime ahead without her.
Parsons died on February 24 last year when the couple, with their 3-year-old daughter in the back of the car, had stopped at the garage. Orson went into the shop, while Bianca and the toddler waited in the car.
In a bizarre series of events which came out during the trial in police-led evidence, Houston and Murrison had followed a red Chery QQ3 into the garage which was believed to have been the target of the two accused. It was meant to be a revenge hit on Joseph Errol Ernest and his son Juade who allegedly killed Houston’s relative, Llewellyn Edwards, the previous year.
The woman driving the red Chery into the garage that evening was believed to be Antoinette Ernest, Joseph’s wife.
But she had also exited her vehicle to go into the shop. The two red vehicles were next to each other. In video footage, Murrison was seen approaching the red Polo and firing two shots.
Bianca Parsons got out of her vehicle and collapsed as her daughter remained wide-eyed and silent in the car.
While Murrison had pleaded guilty to all three charges, Houston had pleaded not guilty.
When the trial started, concerned Wentworth residents expressed fears for the safety of witnesses during the trial, describing Houston as a feared drug dealer.
Handing down her verdict yesterday, Judge Esther Steyn found Murrison guilty on all three counts for which he was charged: murder, attempted murder and possession of a firearm without a licence, while she found Houston guilty on count one for murder as accessory after the fact.
Sentencing was set down for Monday February 11.