S.Africa: Murder: I subjected her to the most terrible fear

Donovan Moodley, who kidnapped and murdered Leigh Matthews for R50 000, has confronted the grim price of his greed - the insufferable price paid by Leigh and her family.

Moodley appeared in the Johannesburg High Court for the second time on Tuesday, and his further admissions to court were in sharp contrast to his first confession.

On Monday, when he confessed to kidnapping Leigh, extorting money from her father and murdering her, his explanation of plea was cloaked in clinical legalese.

On Tuesday, he used emotional words to describe his act - but the statement remained bereft of remorse or apology.

'Mr and Mrs Matthews were also subjected to the utmost anxiety'

He acknowledged that his actions had been "heinous", adding: "It is admitted that as a result of my actions, the deceased was subjected to the most terrible fear and uncertainty throughout the day of the incident, up until the time she was killed by me."

In his statement, Moodley further conceded "that as a result of my actions, Mr and Mrs Matthews were also subjected to the utmost anxiety". Their experience had been one of "incomprehensible psychological anguish and suffering".

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He also admitted that he had spent the R50 000 he extorted from Leigh's parents on motorbike repairs and an engagement ring.

"Part of the ransom was deposited into my banking account and spent on odds and ends as well as an engagement ring. Part of the money was used to pay off a debt incurred in respect of repairs to my Ducati motorbike," he said.

While Moodley tried to portray himself as honest and giving a thorough account of his crimes, the state was equally insistent that he was lying.

Leigh had lost a tremendous amount of blood

On Monday, Moodley was found guilty of kidnapping Leigh from Bond University in Sandton; the extortion of a ransom from her parents; and her murder.

Moodley claimed in Monday's confession that he had ordered Leigh to strip and cover herself with a blanket before he shot her in the head. He claimed to have dragged her into bushes and shot her three more times before leaving her body in the deserted Walkerville spot, 15km south of Johannesburg, where her body was eventually found.

Prosecutor Zaais van Zyl said on Tuesday that the state did not believe that the place where Matthews had been murdered was the spot where her body was found.

Senior state pathologist and head of forensic medicine at Wits Medical School, Dr Hendrik Scholtz, who conducted Leigh's autopsy, told the court he believed that Leigh had been murdered and her body placed first in cold storage and later transferred to the spot where it was found.

Scholtz spent hours on Tuesday going painstakingly through his evidence and explaining his findings in simple terms.

Leigh had lost a tremendous amount of blood, he said, yet very little was found on the scene. A weather report for the area indicated that temperatures during the period between Leigh's disappearance and the discovery of her body ranged between minus 5°C and 15°C.

The body's temperature would have fluctuated with the air temperature, and decomposition would have set in had it lain in the veld - yet the body had not decomposed.

Freezer burns on the soles of her feet; the fact that the skin had not been eaten by insects; and the absence of fly eggs or larvae led him to believe that the body had been refrigerated.

Advocate Johan Pretorius SC said Moodley was adamant he had shot Leigh and left the body where it was found.

This article was originally published on page 1 of The Star on July 27, 2005

Source: Independent Online (IOL)

URL: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click...