Durban — The right side of the face of a slain Newlands West mother had been burnt and she had a hole in her forehead.
This was what the Durban High Court heard of the condition of Smangele Simamane's body as her husband led evidence in the witness stand on Tuesday.
Senzo Simamane told the court that Smangele's arm had also been burnt and her right eye was open and grey.
The trial against mother and daughter, Slindile Pamela Zamisa and Andile Zamisa, finally got under way after it had been meant to begin last Tuesday.
The two are charged with the 2020 kidnapping and murders of Smangele and her daughter, Sbongakonke Mthembu,12.
They had been charged with a teenager who had been 13 years old at the time of the alleged offence, however the teen on Tuesday indicated that she was going to plead guilty.
Following a successful application by the State for a separation of trial where the teen would officially tender in her guilty plea on Thursday, the trial against the Zamisa women began.
It is alleged that Smangele and her daughter were assaulted, had boiling water poured on them and their bodies bundled into a large suitcase and dumped on Lwandle Drive near the Umgeni River in KwaDabeka.
Simamane said that the last time he had seen his wife alive on that day was after she had made him lunch, kissed him on the forehead and had later woken him to tell him she was going out of the house to sort out Sbongakonke’s issue.
He said that when he woke it was evening. He had phoned his mother and his brother-in-law and had around midnight gone to his in-law’s home all in search of his wife and child.
Simamane said the following morning around 4.30am his instinct was telling him something was wrong and he went to report it to neighbours and saw that the tuckshop was already open.
He said the person at the tuckshop told him he had last seen Sbongankoke at the Zamisa house.
“I found it strange that when I got there at that hour of the morning the people there were busy outside and there was a fire. They were burning something. I went to the gate and the teenager was sitting down I told her that my wife and Sbonga were missing and that they were last seen there. She was about to answer me when Slindile (Zamisa) came and was rude when she said they had been at her house and they had spoken then they left going to the shop. She said this flicking her hand dismissively.”
Simamane said he then went to the police to report the mother and daughter missing, adding that when he went back to Zamisa’s property there was no one there anymore.
He said that while they awaited a K9 unit to arrive to search the property, he learned that two bodies had been found in KwaDabeka and police took him to the mortuary in Pinetown where he confirmed the bodies as that of his wife and stepchild.
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