SOUTH Africa’s youngest surviving crime victim, Courtney Ellerbeck, turned one on Friday, SABC radio news reported. Courtney became a crime statistic while still in the womb. Her mother, Leslie-Ann Ellerbeck, was shot in the stomach during an attempted hijacking in Boksburg and underwent caesarean surgery. The baby had emergency surgery a few days later after doctors found her bowel had been perforated by the bullet. Trauma from the bullet wound also caused spinal nerve damage, leaving the baby partly paralysed. A year later no arrests have been made and medical bills of a quarter-of-a-million rand still have to be paid. Courtney is a cheerful baby, unaware of doctors’ fears that she may be paralysed for life.