A 23-YEAR-OLD man admitted in the Windhoek High Court yesterday that he used an axe to murder his girlfriend at a farm in the Gobabis district two years ago.
“I was consumed by anger and failed to control my anger,” Johannes Bock (23) stated in a written plea explanation which defence lawyer Milton Engelbrecht read to the court after Bock admitted guilt on a charge of murder.
Bock also said in the statement that he wanted to kill his then girlfriend, Martha Afrikaner (22), when he struck her with an axe at the farm Dabis in the Gobabis district on 5 October 2017.
He recounted that he hit Afrikaner with an axe when she ran out of a room where he was confronting her about the future of their relationship, after he had found her in intimate situations with her former boyfriend.
Bock stated that when Afrikaner ran out of the room he followed her and hit her with the axe that he had with him.
“I chopped her on the side of her head while she was running away,” he said. “I chased her and chopped her because I was very angry and she provoked me.”
He also said: “I knew that if I chopped [her] on her head it would cause injuries that could lead to her death.
“It was my intention to kill [Afrikaner] at the time when I chopped her.”
Based on Bock’s plea and the accompanying explanation, acting judge Kaijata Kangueehi convicted him of murder, committed with a direct intention to kill.
Bock said in his plea statement that he caught Afrikaner and an ex-boyfriend together in bed one night during the last week of September 2017.
He said he told her father about the incident, over which he felt betrayed and disrespected by Afrikaner.
Bock continued that he also told Afrikaner’s father after she and her ex-boyfriend again shared a bed on 2 October 2017.
He said he was planning to return from Dabis to Gobabis on 5 October when he heard his and Afrikaner’s baby crying. When he went into Afrikaner’s room, he found her and her former boyfriend in an embrace, he said.
Bock said he asked Afrikaner what they were going to do about their relationship, but she stayed quiet and did not answer him.
Bock said he went to fetch an axe, and when he returned with it he asked Afrikaner why she was not answering.
Following that question, Afrikaner ran out of the room, and he pursued her and hit her with the axe, Bock said.
Following the recording of Bock’s plea, the start of his presentence hearing was postponed to tomorrow.
Bock is being kept in custody.
State advocate Erick Moyo is prosecuting.
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