Durban — The trial against a Pinetown nurse alleged to have hired her brother and another person to kill her husband, a Transnet employee, is set to continue in the Durban High Court on Monday.
Nomphumelelo Patricia Goncalves, out on bail, is alleged to have hired Nkosinathi Steven Zungu, who remains behind bars, to kidnap her husband, Nkosi Timmy Langa, from their Pinetown home and kill him.
The nurse and her brother are on trial for the murder and robbery, Goncalves faces two more charges of defeating the course of justice for allegedly falsely reporting her husband missing and the theft of his car.
A previous State witness and hitman in the matter, James Mashudu “Ramaphosa” Mthimkhulu, testified before the court how Langa was killed with an electric cord cut from an iron in his home, it was put around his neck and Zungu pulled one end while Mthimkhulu allegedly pulled the other.
Langa was allegedly kidnapped from his home after the men gained entry through the main gate.
They entered through a door, that was intentionally left unlocked, allegedly by his wife.
Langa was taken in his Isuzu X- Raider and driven to where he was strangled to death and left in a forest in Ozwathini.
It is alleged that Goncalves hired the men to murder Langa because she allegedly endured physical abuse at his hands.
The trial which has seen a number of delays began last year in May running into June, is expected to sit until July 7.
The first delay happened after Mthimkhulu testified where Goncalves did not pitch in court when she was there the previous day and instead, a doctor’s note was sent on her behalf.
Subsequent to her diagnosis she was referred to a psychiatric hospital for treatment, she was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Howick.
New trial dates were then set for September last year however amid the trial there was another delay.
Zungu indicated that he wanted to change lawyers, his reasoning was that his current Legal Aid attorney was not Zulu-speaking and sometimes he did not understand his lawyer, so he requested to be represented by a Zulu-speaking lawyer.
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Daily News