A man suspected of murdering a Pretoria woman whose corpse was found in a car boot earlier this month was rearrested on Monday after his case was struck off the roll in the city’s regional court earlier in the day.
Magistrate Bheki Ntshingila had struck the case off the roll, apparently because the accused, Danie van der Walt, was taken into custody on Wednesday and only appeared in court on Monday, instead of Friday.
Van der Walt, from Meyers Park, eastern Pretoria, was not allowed to leave the court building a free man as police rearrested him within an hour of the case being struck off.
The murder case is to start once again at the same court on Tuesday.
Police spokesperson Superintendent Piletji Sebola said Van der Walt was taken into custody for questioning on Wednesday and arrested on Friday after confessing to the murder of 20-year-old Marlene Mauer.
The woman appeared to have been killed by several blows to the head with a blunt object. She was found in the boot of her boyfriend’s car outside a restaurant in Hatfield in the city, a day after she went missing.
The man in custody was not Mauer’s boyfriend, said Sebola.
Police said the killer appeared to have lured her with the promise of a job interview.
Her family reported her missing on the evening of Friday February 10 when she failed to return her house after leaving for Hatfield at 8am that day.
”The woman’s home was broken into at the weekend while she was missing, but so far that is being treated as a separate case,” Sithole said. — Sapa