Why South Africans are killing children abroad
SOME criminologists are calling on the government to deploy more police attachés at our embassies around the world, as more South Africans abroad are being arrested for serious and violent crimes such as child murders in recent months.
Experts warn that a stressful life abroad, including financial and emotional pressures, could be some of the factors triggering extreme violence against children in the home.
Just last week, Pretoria-born Reinhardt Bosch and his German wife, Noemi Kondacs, made an appearance in an Australian court following the murder of their seven-month-old son. The duo are facing charges of murder and torture.
The Australian court is set to prove that the torture had allegedly occurred during the duration of the infant’s life, while Bosch is facing an additional charge of assault. The couple are expected to be back in court on December 5.
According to the Brisbane Times, the infant, Rhuan Immanuel Bosch, was found unresponsive inside the couple’s home, north of Brisbane.
Another case which made international headlines is that of Lauren Anne Dickason, who allegedly murdered her three daughters, Liané, 6, and twins Maya and Karla, 2, in New Zealand in September 2021.
Dickason is married to South African doctor Graham Dickason, who reportedly returned to South Africa in December 2021. It’s alleged the children had been murdered with cable ties.
The mother had reportedly been on chronic medication and had stopped taking it because she had feared it would affect their immigration application.
The couple moved to New Zealand after the father accepted a job at the Timaru Hospital as an orthopaedic surgeon, while she is a medical doctor.
She is scheduled to go on trial next year and has pleaded not guilty to the charges and is being kept at a psychiatric facility in New Zealand.
A criminologist at Stellenbosch University, Guy Lamb, said various factors
including stress and the change in environment were possible reasons why South Africans abroad were committing violence on children.
“We know quite a bit, due to research, about why parents perpetrate violence against children. There is a combination of factors and in the case of South Africans abroad perpetrating violence against children, it is often a combination of factors from biological and social backgrounds, that parents find themselves in, often in the context of neighbourhoods where they live.
“For example, a South African parent living overseas may have had risks for perpetrating violence against children and move overseas, then the environment and circumstances over there can contribute to increasing the risk. The move there might bring additional stress and conflict in relationships, in addition to job losses or lack of income. That can contribute to it.
“But the point is there are lots of different factors that contribute to violence against children, and often the home dynamics are about violence and conflict. In extreme violence there can be individual factors with the perpetrators,” Lamb said.
Criminologist and director of the African Centre for Security Studies and Intelligence Praxis, Eldred de Klerk, said the South African government also had a role to play when people were charged abroad.
“Many of us have been encouraging the South African government and
Dirco in particular to house more police attachés at our embassies and consulates around the world; well yes, more and more South Africans are getting into trouble around the world.”
Department of International Relations and Co-operation (Dirco) spokesperson Clayson Monyela, said once South Africans became residents in foreign countries and were charged with crimes, the South African government is not involved in any legal processes.
“We do not have any role and our mandate is only consular, to act as a liaison for someone who is visiting, and we will alert their family and if they require legal assistance.
“If this person is a resident, they will fall under that country’s laws.”
Bulewa Makeke of the National Prosecuting Authority said they had no involvement with criminal cases abroad unless these involved an extradition process: “The NPA has no role when South Africans commit crimes in other jurisdictions.
“They get charged there in terms of the laws of that country.”