A consultant at the Waterfront branch of Rennies Travel Service, who allegedly stole R250 000 from her employer, told the Cape Town Regional Court on Wednesday she was a victim of a witchcraft scam.
Deonay Anderton (40) of Sun Valley, said she had been duped by a sangoma into ”borrowing” the money from her employer in order to obtain a gift of R1-million, which evil spirits wished her to have.
The sangoma needed R250 000 in ”clean” money to place on top of the R1-million in ”blood” money, to cleanse the blood money, she told the court.
Anderton pleaded not guilty to theft.
Defence counsel Laurie Wilken said she had merely borrowed the money, not stolen it, and had had every intention of replacing it as soon as it had served its purpose.
As it turned out, a briefcase supposedly containing the R1-million as well as the R250 000 from Rennies, was found to be stuffed with old newspapers, magazines and a brick.
Anderton told the court she had been instructed to keep the briefcase locked and untouched on top of a freezer overnight, and to open it in the morning to receive her R1-million gift.
She said she had become hysterical when she finally opened the case. She had then informed her husband and an aunt before phoning her work supervisor, Wendy Bierman.
She later took detectives to the sangoma’s consulting room in Wynberg.
She told the court she had been involved with sangomas since childhood.
A ”Dr Lusuku” had removed a curse from her young daughter, as well as a number of tokoloshes from her home, with the use of animal blood painted on the walls.
This had cost R11 000, which her husband had paid.
She had later received a call from another sangoma, ”Dr Adam”, who had said she should fetch medication and instructions about her house, left for her at the consulting rooms by Lusuku.
When she fetched the medication, Adam told her the spirits had favoured her and wished to give her a gift of R1-million.
However, she first had to get the clean money.
Adam had suggested she secretly borrow the money from her employer, and had assured her it was not theft.
He had also assured her the R250 000 would be given back to her, to replace, after it had served its purpose.
She had been required, in a pitch dark room, to spit seven times into the open case containing the R1-million, as part of the cleansing ritual.
Questioned by the magistrate, she said Adam had threatened to harm her and her family if she told anyone about the case full of money.
She added: ”Half of me knew it was wrong to take the money from my employer, but the other half knew I was not stealing it.”
The hearing continues on June 28. – Sapa