She only wanted her ex-husband hijacked so she could have a few days’ peace, bank consultant Juanita Coetzee testified on Tuesday in the Johannesburg High Court, where she is on trial for his murder.
She had not cared what happened to Ivan Coetzee, she admitted before Justice Joop Labuschagne. However, at the last minute she sent an eleventh-hour SMS cancelling the attempt on his life, she claimed.
Ivan Coetzee (her second husband) was stabbed in his arm in the botched hijacking, but was shot dead when he entered the Westonaria home he and his ex-wife still shared on his return from receiving medical treatment.
Coetzee, 30, has already pleaded guilty to attempted murder, murder and defeating the ends of justice by making a false statement to the police regarding the murder of her ex-husband.
Her evidence on Tuesday was to correct ”the lies” state witnesses had told of her sexual preferences, the court heard.
Her ex-husband would tie her up and ”assault her with a whip or sjambok”, but she ”hated it”, Coetzee testified. It was one of the many reasons she wanted to be rid of him.
She denied urging her first husband to hire pornographic movies featuring scenes of whipping, and denied having sex in a police cell with Jakobus Johannes Beauzec. He was convicted of killing Ivan Coetzee, but claimed Juanita Coetzee masterminded the murder.
Also denying that she liked rough sex, Coetzee on Tuesday claimed that the box of handcuffs, whips and other sex toys previously presented to the court as evidence had not belonged to her, but to her second husband.
A ”domineering” control freak, he had told her what to wear and decided how her salary would be spent, had driven a vehicle over a dog and shot dead two of her dogs, she alleged.
He disliked her daughter who lived with an aunt, Coetzee testified, denying that she was not interested in the child.
She claimed he started punching her when he was drunk or angry just six months after they married in 2000, but stopped after she was sent home from work a few times.
Although both went briefly for psychological help, she did not go to the police even when later, while angered, he tied her up and whipped her then photographed her. On one occasion she needed stitches.
Cross-examined by the prosecutor, advocate Wilhelmien Vos, Coetzee admitted she tied her husband up and whipped him on occasion, on request, but that this did not happen every time before sex.
Coetzee denied that she wanted him dead before he changed his will, denied threatening to shoot him if he left her for another woman, and denied finding out that he had met another woman after they divorced in May this year.
The trial continues. — Sapa