“We were still sitting on the couch when the next moment a massive man with a balaclava and a shorter man appeared. The tall one had a gun and the short man had a monkey wrench with him.”
“Do you know God?”
This was the question a farm attack victim in Lusthoff in northern Pretoria repeatedly asked her attacker after he threatened to rape her. Sonja Mostert and her boyfriend, Lukas van Heerden, are the recent victims of farm attacks and various robberies in northern Pretoria in June.
Last Thursday the couple relaxed in front of the television when two suspects, disguised with balaclavas, appeared in the door leading to their bedrooms. The sight of the two unwelcome guests was only the beginning of the six hours’ ordeal.
“We thought we heard something and turned down the TV, but it was quiet then. Lukas went outside to inspect but saw nothing alarming. The only thing he saw was that it looked like one of the cattle broke through the fence. The dogs didn’t even bark,”
“We were still sitting on the couch when the next moment a massive man with a balaclava and a shorter man appeared. The tall one had a gun and the short man had a monkey wrench with him.”
Mostert said the suspects calmly told them to ‘keep quiet’. Then they cut the living room lamp’s electrical cords off and started to tie them up. The suspects immediately demanded money and firearms.
“They took some of Lukas’ shoelaces to tie him up tighter.”
The couple was then instructed to lie on the ground while the suspects began to search the house for valuables. While Mostert was tied up on the floor, she started to get an anxiety attack. Then one of the suspects drained an entire bottle of wine over her head to try and ‘calm her down’.
She pleaded to be untied because she was struggling to breathe.
“He untied my hands behind me and retied my hands in front of me. He then took me to one of the rooms and threw me on top of the bed before he walked out of the room and locked the door,” she said.
“After a while, he returned, saying that Lukas was dead because he did not want to cooperate.”
Mostert said she told him to kill her and get it over with.
“He then said he wanted to show me something and took off my pyjama pants and unzipped his pants. It was then that I hysterically shouted at him, ‘Do you know God? Do you have children? What would you do if this was happening to your family?”
Mostert pleaded persistently. The suspect the fetched a pair of socks and stuffed it into Mostert’s mouth, put a pillow on her face and tossed a tablecloth over her and walked away.
“After it started to quiet down I heard Lukas calling my name. I got up and forced myself through the small space of the window and ran around the house to get to him.”
At around 04:15 Mostert called their farmworker for help and the authorities were notified shortly thereafter. About 80% of the stolen goods such as clothing, shoes, bedding, mattresses, refrigerators, sofas and the vehicles were recovered in Soshanguve a few days after the attack.
The vehicles and the goods were recovered with the help of Tracker and GAC Risk Solutions.
“After the robbery, we had one blanket left and Lukas didn’t have a single thing left to wear.”
Both Mostert and her boyfriend were severely traumatised by the incident and are currently receiving counseling.