The Pietermaritzburg High Court has found a 14-year-old girl guilty of murder and theft following the death of her grandmother two years ago.
Judgement was given in the Pietermaritzburg High Court on Thursday, and the case adjourned for sentencing on December 13.
The grandmother was killed in Pietermaritzburg in September 2002.
According to prosecutor Sandesh Sankar, the girl, who was 12 at the time, told the court she had acted on orders from a family friend to kill the grandmother. The friend claimed the grandmother was planning to kill the girl’s mother and brother.
The teenager said she was concerned about her family and felt she had no option but to kill her grandmother.
Sankar said Judge Kevin Swain found that she had lied and that there had been problems in the relationship between the teenager and her grandmother about things like discipline.
She apparently approached two men in the street outside the house to kill Govender while she was sleeping.
At a previous trial, the two men confessed to their role in the murder and were sent to jail.
The teenager was also found guilty of the theft of several of her grandmother’s possessions, including clothes, jewellery, a video machine and decoder, with which she allegedly paid the men.
Sankar said the teenager had been released into her mother’s custody shortly after her arrest and would stay with her until the sentencing in December.
He said she had been attending school since her release. – Sapa