Juanita’s head found

JUANITA Mabula’s head has been found. Detectives investigating Mabula’s death reported that her head had been found some five kilometres south of the turn-off to Groot Aub on the main road between Windhoek and Rehoboth yesterday, Chief Inspector Hieronymus Goraseb, Commanding Officer of the Police’s Public Relations and Liaison Division, announced yesterday afternoon.

“The find is very important and investigators are optimistic that it will further assist in the tracing of the murderer(s), as forensic investigations are also being conducted,” Goraseb said. He told The Namibian later that the Police were sure that the head found yesterday was Mabula’s, since it had been positively identified as hers.”The investigators are certain it’s the head,” he said.COPS MUM ON DETAILS Goraseb could not say in what condition the head was when it was found, and declined to say whether detectives themselves or someone else had found it.He did not want to disclose further information at this stage, for fear of jeopardising the ongoing investigation of the case, Goraseb said.However, a source who visited the scene yesterday reported that the head was discovered by a resident of the Rehoboth area who was cutting grass to be used as fodder for his livestock.While going about that task, the man detected a foul smell.When he started looking for the source of the smell, he found a decomposing human head lying in thick grass next to the entrance to a stormwater culvert passing under the B1 main road.That point was just over 50 km from Windhoek, where Mabula’s decapitated body was discovered on the morning of September 25.Her body was found next to the city’s Western Bypass Road, close to the Windhoek Turf Club.Because of the small amount of blood found at the scene, it is suspected that Mabula was killed or decapitated somewhere else.The rest of her body was without apparent injuries, which left investigators without direct clues about the way she had been murdered.Mabula, a single mother who would have turned 22 a week after she was found dead, had last been seen in the vicinity of Windhoek’s Chez Ntemba nightclub between four and five hours before her remains were found.Her family buried her at Mariental, where she grew up, two weeks after her death.While the discovery of her head presented investigators with a major breakthrough in their investigation of the case, no arrests had been made by yesterday, Goraseb said.He told The Namibian later that the Police were sure that the head found yesterday was Mabula’s, since it had been positively identified as hers.”The investigators are certain it’s the head,” he said.COPS MUM ON DETAILS Goraseb could not say in what condition the head was when it was found, and declined to say whether detectives themselves or someone else had found it.He did not want to disclose further information at this stage, for fear of jeopardising the ongoing investigation of the case, Goraseb said.However, a source who visited the scene yesterday reported that the head was discovered by a resident of the Rehoboth area who was cutting grass to be used as fodder for his livestock.While going about that task, the man detected a foul smell. When he started looking for the source of the smell, he found a decomposing human head lying in thick grass next to the entrance to a stormwater culvert passing under the B1 main road.That point was just over 50 km from Windhoek, where Mabula’s decapitated body was discovered on the morning of September 25.Her body was found next to the city’s Western Bypass Road, close to the Windhoek Turf Club.Because of the small amount of blood found at the scene, it is suspected that Mabula was killed or decapitated somewhere else.The rest of her body was without apparent injuries, which left investigators without direct clues about the way she had been murdered.Mabula, a single mother who would have turned 22 a week after she was found dead, had last been seen in the vicinity of Windhoek’s Chez Ntemba nightclub between four and five hours before her remains were found.Her family buried her at Mariental, where she grew up, two weeks after her death.While the discovery of her head presented investigators with a major breakthrough in their investigation of the case, no arrests had been made by yesterday, Goraseb said.