Senzo Meyiwa: No evidence of contract killing

There was no evidence that the murder of Bafana Bafana and Orlando Pirates goalkeeper Senzo Meyiwa was a contract killing, police said.

Briefing reporters in Johannesburg today, National Police Commissioner Riah Phiyega said crime intelligence and investigators will be heading up the multidisciplinary task team that will investigate Meyiwa’s murder.

Meyiwa was shot in the upper body at his girlfriend Kelly Khumalo’s home in Vosloorus.

Phiyega said that the investigators will be a combination of the national investigating unit and the national and provincial crime intelligence.

“Right now investigators are back at the crime scene and they are trying to find more information and clues about what happened,” Phiyega said.

“We understand that there were two suspects who entered the house while a third one was outside, a shot was fired and the goalkeeper was hit on the upper body.

“The three suspects fled on foot and right now the police are putting together identikits. Once this is done it will be given to the media,” she said.

Phiyega said that the information that the police have is that two suspects are in their 20’s and the third suspect is in their 30’s. One is slender and tall with dreadlocks. The other is slender, dark and well built.

Police urged the three suspects to hand themselves in or their parents should hand them over to the police station.

Police have also learned that there were seven people in the house at the time and they have given statements including what the perpetrators look like and how the incident happened.

Khumalo has also been interviewed and she has been assisting with compiling the identikits.

Head for General Detectives, Major General Norman Taioe, said there is no reason for the police to doubt her evidence.

But he denied that the goalkeeper was trying to protect her as he was shot.

“The deceased was moving towards the door and that was when the shot was fired. He wasn’t protecting any specific person at that time as another person was struggling with the attacker closer to the door. The attackers might have thought he was fighting and they shot him,” added Taioe.

A case of murder and house robbery has been opened.

Acting Gauteng commissioner, Major-General Tebello Mosikili, said that house robberies in the Spruitview and Vosloorus areas are not frequent, especially with this level of violence.

“The cellphone that was taken did not belong to the deceased; it was charging. But it is still a matter under investigation. When the perpetrators got into the house they had asked for a cellphone, this was the one that was closest to them. They took it and fled,” she said.

Mosikili added that the multi-disciplinary task team would be using the forensics team to analyse the evidence at the crime scene and crime intelligence will be looking at tracking the phone.

Source:City Press