Strangler admits guilt, denies second murder

Werner Menges

AN AMINUIS area resident admitted in the High Court in Windhoek yesterday that he murdered his pregnant wife by strangling her with his bare hands. Aloyis Ditshabue (43) made the admission when he went on trial before Acting Judge Maphios Cheda on two counts of murder. He pleaded guilty on one of the charges but denied guilt on the second.

Ditshabue was free on bail on the first murder charge when he was arrested on another murder charge again, after his girlfriend had been stabbed to death.

During the plea proceedings, Ditshabue admitted that he murdered his wife, Marcella Ditshabue (33), in their house at Corridor 18 in the Aminuis area during the night of 16 to 17 February 2008.

He killed her by strangling her, and it was his intention that she should die, Ditshabue said in a plea explanation provided to the court.

Ditshabue stated: “I admit that Marcella Ditshabue died from asphyxia as a result of the strangulation and that I intended to kill her in this way.” He also admitted that she was pregnant at the time he murdered her.

Ditshabue also admitted that he strangled his wife when he first pleaded to that charge in the Gobabis Magistrate’s Court shortly after his first arrest. He claimed on that occasion that he killed his wife because she was committing adultery with another man.

In respect of the second charge, Ditshabue yesterday denied that he murdered his girlfriend, Alida Kambende (36), at Gobabis on 10 July 2011.

The prosecution is alleging that Ditshabue killed Kambende by stabbing her at least six times with a knife at the house where they were living in the Epako area of Gobabis.

Ditshabue is denying that he stabbed her with a knife, or that he even had an intention to hurt, injure or kill her, defence lawyer Willem Visser informed Acting Judge Cheda when he provided the plea explanation to the court.

After being arrested on the first murder charge in February 2008, Ditshabue was kept in police custody until he was granted bail in an amount of N$1 000 in June 2008. He was free on bail until Kambende was killed.

Kambende’s mother, Regina Arikumbi, testified yesterday that her daughter and Ditshabue did not have a harmonious relationship. They quarrelled often, and on one occasion Ditshabue threatened that he would still kill not only Kambende but also her mother and even their livestock, Arikumbi said.

Kambende’s daughter, Fulgentia Kambende, testified that her mother and Ditshabue were not on speaking terms during the week before her death.

She said when she and her boyfriend arrived at her mother’s house, where they were also staying, during the morning of 10 July 2011, they found Ditshabue in a kneeling position inside the house, with her mother lying on the floor next to him. She was covered with a blanket.

Ditshabue had a knife in his hands, Kambende said. When her boyfriend asked him what he was doing, he used the knife to stab himself in the chest, she said.

Ditshabue is denying that, Visser told the witness.

“I was standing there and watching him stabbing himself,” was Kambende’s response.

She also told the judge that Ditshabue had in the past made a threat that he would cut off her mother’s head.

The trial is continuing.

State advocate Jack Eixab is prosecuting.