Teacher’s alleged killer in a coma
THE ALLEGED triggerman accused of shooting and killing Jayde Panayiotou is in a coma under police guard after being hospitalised due to an unknown illness last month.
This emerged yesterday in the Port Elizabeth High Court, where a pre-trial conference was meant to get under way but was once again postponed.
Christopher Panayiotou is accused of masterminding the abduction and murder of his schoolteacher wife Jayde in April last year.
The State alleges he paid a bouncer from his Infinity nightclub, Luthando Siyoni, to hire hitman Sizwezakhe Vumazonke to kidnap and kill Jayde.
Cellphone plotting showed that a fifth accused, Zolani Sibeko, was with Sinethemba Nenembe and Vumazonke outside Jayde’s Stellen Glenn complex in Kabega Park just five days before she was abducted.
The State alleges Jayde was forced into the boot of a hired vehicle, taken to a remote area in KwaNobuhle and murdered.
During proceedings yesterday, prosecutor Marius Stander indicated Vumazonke was in a coma at Livingstone Hospital. A medical certificate hadn’t been issued and the State was awaiting a toxicology report.
“The medical practitioner of accused number two (Vumazonke) has not issued a certificate as he cannot precisely indicate what is wrong with him,” said Stander.
Last month, a pre-trial conference was meant to get under way but the case was postponed after it emerged Vumazonke had been suffering from an unknown illness.
Judge Glenn Goosen postponed the matter to September 15. – ANA