A 55-year-old man arrested in connection with the murder of a six-year-old boy in Plettenberg Bay has confessed to the crime, police said on Monday.
Inspector Elgin Antonie said the man confessed on Christmas Day. He was arrested on Christmas Eve.
Steven Siebert was last seen on Friday in the company of a dark-haired man with a grey beard in the garden of the house in which his family was staying in Robberg, Plettenberg Bay.
His body was found at 9.45am on Saturday, Antonie said.
Helga Lengacher, an eyewitness, said she saw Siebert with a ”rather hobo-looking” man as she drove past his family’s property on Friday night.
She said on Saturday morning that the man appeared to helping Steven climb up, or out of, a tree.
”The boy was killed. He was found in the bushes,” an emotional Lengacher said.
Steven’s uncle, Paul Buys, said the boy probably disappeared at 7pm on Friday and it was likely that he had wandered in and out of the house in which his family were staying in Stableford Drive.
Holidaymakers and locals helped the police look for him throughout the night.
Antonie said the man will appear in the Plettenberg Bay Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday.
He would not speculate on the motive for the murder, saying this is likely to emerge in court, but discounted a rumour that the killing was related to satanism.
Antonie said the body was not mutilated and it appeared the boy had been strangled.
The body was being taken to a police mortuary at Touwsriver where a post-mortem will be carried out later this week.
Steven’s body was found in thick bush next to the place where his assailant lived — on the property of a house he was employed to renovate.
Antonie said detectives were still on the scene on Monday.
He asked the public to stay away so they would not contaminate the crime scene or its immediate surroundings.
Forensic specialists have visited the scene and taken evidence to Cape Town for analysis.
Antonie said there are no other suspects in the case. — Sapa