The five men on trial for the murder of Senzo Meyiwa. Image: Nokwanda Ncwane/The South African.
Cellphone records link all the accused in Senzo Meyiwa murder trial
The Gauteng High Court heard that all the accused in the Senzo Meyiwa murder trial communicated before the goalkeeper was shot and killed.
The five men on trial for the murder of Senzo Meyiwa. Image: Nokwanda Ncwane/The South African.
All the five men charged with the murder of Senzo Meyiwa communicated before they carried out the hit.
This was revealed by cellphone data analyst Lieutenant Colonel Gideon Gouws as he testified on Wednesday, 17 April.
SENZO MEYIWA MURDER ACCUSED LINKED BY CELLPHONE RECORDS
During his testimony, Gouws revealed that he was asked to take over from Colonel Lambertus Steyn when he retired.
Steyn told the court in July 2023 that accused 5 a well-known hitman from KwaZulu-Natal Fisokuhle Ntuli called Meyiwa’s girlfriend Kelly Khumalo twice in 2014 before Meyiwa was killed.
Meyiwa was shot at Khumalo’s home in Vosloorus on 26 October 2014 in what was initially thought to be a botched robbery. Police have since indicated that it was a hit.
Steyn also testified that cellphone records revealed that Khumalo was in contact with accused 1 Muzikawukhulelwa Sibiya.
Five men are on trial for the murder the former Bafana Bafana captain. The men are MuzikawukhulelwaSibiya, Bongani Ntanzi, Mthobisi Prince Mncube, Mthokoziseni Maphisa and Fisokuhle Nkani Ntuli.
The men face charges of premeditated murder, attempted murder, robbery with aggravated circumstances, possession of firearms without a licence, and possession of ammunition. All five men pleaded not guilty.
On Wednesday, Gouws told the court that there was communication between all the accused and that they knew each other.
He said police could not download data from Ntanzi’s cellphone due to a pattern security code. However, they managed to extract data from his two sim cards and the memory card in the phone.
Ntanzi was contacted by the fifth accused, Fisokuhle Ntuli, who made contact with all the other accused.
The court previously heard that police confiscated a cellphone from Ntanzi where he was detained at the Villieria Police Station in Pretoria in 2021.
Ntanzi reportedly downloaded pictures of guns and updated his WhatsApp statuses while in custody. However, he denied this claim saying his cellphone and another that belonged to his sister were taken by police during his arrest on 16 June 2020.
Notably, the picture of a firearm found in Ntanzi’s phone is the same that was found on accused 3’s cellphone.
