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Five men accused of murdering two Polokwane businesswomen were in the dock.
- The Polokwane Court of First Instance heard Tuesday that the husband arrested for conspiring to kill his wife confessed to the crime.
- This was revealed by Investigative NCO Gerhadus Kotze during the man’s bail request hearing.
- The court also heard that the man attempted suicide.
The man accused of ordering a hit on his businesswoman wife and her colleague made some surprising admissions immediately after his arrest, the Polokwane Magistrates Court heard Tuesday.
The disclosure was made by Warrant Officer Gerhadus Kotze during the bail hearing of 57-year-old Thabo Stanley Leshabane, and his four co-defendants are believed to be “hitmen.”
The four co-defendants are Ndondo Buthelezi, 25, John Zulu, 30, Bhekimuzi Phiyose, 34, and Thembelani Dlamini, 30.
Kotze told Magistrate Janine Ungerer that Leshabane admitted to members of the investigation team that he hired the four co-defendants to kill his wife Makoena Mabusela-Leshabane.
READ | Two women shot at point-blank range in Polokwane
Leshabane also provided the team with a photo of his wife and described the car that the alleged “hitmen” used to travel from Gauteng to Polokwane to commit the crime.
Kotze said:
He also told (the hit men) that he will also be in Polokwane on the day (of the murders). He knew where the (two) deceased were going to sleep the night before. He even placed the tracker in his wife’s car so that he could always know the whereabouts of his wife.
He said Leshabane also admitted that he was having problems with his wife. He suspected that his wife was having an extramarital affair with a “certain man.”
At one point, Leshabane reported a case to the police in which he claimed that his wife had been abducted by the man.
The case was not logged because police went to the man’s home and found his wife there, Kotze said.
Motivated against granting bail, Kotze said that Leshabane attempted suicide and that there was a witness who took him to the hospital.
Kotze said:
He even told the witness that he no longer wants to live.
Leshabane had two previous convictions related to traffic offenses and for labeling people as “witches” in Bolobedu.
According to Kotze, Leshabane also admitted to providing the “hitmen” with money to travel from Gauteng to Polokwane.
Kotze also provided details on how the four co-defendants traveled from Katlehong in Gauteng to Polokwane to commit the crime.
He said the tracker records of the car they used showed that he left Katlehong at 05:00 on the day of the killings and arrived in Polokwane shortly after 07:00.
While still in Katlehong, the car, registered in the name of defendant number two, Zulu, as a metered taxi with Uber, stopped three times to apparently pick up the other co-defendant.
In Polokwane, the car was parked for a long time outside the shelter where Leshabane’s wife and her colleague slept at night.
The wife, Makoena Mabusela-Leshabane, 46, and her colleague Tebogo Mphuti, 35, were shot and killed after viewing commercial property on October 10, 2020.
Kotze said the CCTV footage obtained located the four defendants at the scene.
The first to be arrested was Zulu, who led the other defendants to the police.
The bond hearing was expected to continue on Wednesday.
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