[ad_1]
(Photo: Getty / Gallo Images)
- A woman from the Eastern Cape hired a hit man to kill her husband for R120,000, which he did.
- The woman, Nomqondiso Thembu, became friends with Busiswa Nabi and convinced her to do the same with the same hit man.
- The hit man, Siphiwe Wili and Nabi fell in love and were arrested before they could murder her husband.
An Eastern Cape woman who hired a hit man to kill her husband and then convinced another woman she met in a taxi to hire the same hit man for a similar purpose has been sentenced to life in prison.
Nomoken Thembu, 53, and hitman Siphiwe Wili, 46, were sentenced to life in prison by the Mdantsane Magistrates Court on Friday.
News24 previously reported that Thembu was seeking to kill her husband when she met Wili. She offered him 120,000 rand and then introduced Wili to her husband on the pretext that he was her cousin.
The victim, Arthur Thembu, and Wili became good friends until he killed him when they were returning home from a soccer game on February 24, 2017.
Arthur Thembu’s body was found near the Sisa Dukashe stadium in Mdantsane, the Hawks said.
The motive for the murder was found to be money. Thembu wanted her husband’s life insurance and pension.
Wili was paid R60,000 out of the R120,000 in March 2017 after payment of the funeral policies.
A couple of months later, while riding in a taxi, Thembu met Busiswa Nabi and the two became friends.
READ | It’s complicated: the wife, the hitman, the insurance money and the love triangle
Nabi shared her marital problems with Thembu, who later encouraged her to have her husband killed. Thembu told Nabi that she would also benefit from her husband’s life insurance and pension.
Nabi then contacted Wili with the intention of hiring him to kill her husband. But during the planning of the murder, the two fell in love.
“Members of the Serious Organized Crime Investigation were alerted to the plot and the suspects were arrested in November 2017, before the murder occurred,” Hawks spokesman Lwando Zenzile said in a statement.
Wili was sentenced to an additional 13 years for conspiracy to commit murder.
News24 reported that in March 2019, Nabi received a suspended sentence and agreed to become a state witness.
The head of the Hawks, Lieutenant General Godfrey Lebeya, applauded the investigation team for working around the clock to make sure the suspects were eventually convicted and sentenced.
“It is discouraging that spouses kill each other to collect insurance policies. The organizers go to the extreme [sic] of pretending to be in mourning for loved ones, “Lebeya said.
“I congratulate the investigators for leaving no stone unturned when discovering the plan that also saved a life and many others that were to follow. The work of the team, including prosecutors, is commendable. The sentence will serve as a warning to those who think that the crime pays. “
