The family of a 28-year-old woman, Danelle van der Linde, who was allegedly stabbed to death by her boyfriend in Kimberley is pleading that the suspect remains behind bars as they believe that he might be a danger to his and the victim’s two children.
The family spokesperson, Shaine Griqua, said that the suspect allegedly stabbed Van der Linde in front of their nine-years old son over the weekend before fleeing the scene.
The couple had two children, aged nine and 12. At the time of her murder, Van Linde was pregnant with their third child. He eventually handed himself to the police. He appeared in court on Wednesday for his bail hearing. The hearing was postponed to next week, Wednesday.
The family fears that if he is released on bail, he will harm is two children. “Our fear as a family is that this man may be dangerous to the children, hence we want him to remain in jail" said Griqua.
He called on government to help provide counselling for the child who witnessed the crime.
“We are saddened by what happened, and we call on government to provide psychological support to the children of the deceased, especially the nine-year-old because he witnessed everything during that fateful night, and it is going to be difficult for him to forget.”
He said the suspect has always been abusive towards the late Van der Linde, but the family did not think he would murder her in such a brutal manner.
“She wanted to end the relationship with him so that might be the reason he killed her, and the fact that they have two children together, and she was pregnant at the time of her death. It really pains us as a family, all we want is justice nothing else.”
Another community member, Shelly Van Wyk, said that this incident has brought a lot of pain as the deceased was very passionate about community work and she was also part of Advice and Development Centre which stands against femicide and gender-based violence.
“She was against gender based violence, but in the end she was killed by the father of her children. That was really sad. You could see that she was tired of the abuse that is why she ended up moving from where she was staying to come and stay with her sister. But that man kept on following her and ended up killing her on the birthday of their son, the pain is unbearable even to us as the community because we have lost a great person.”
On Thursday the MEC of Social Development, Nontobeko Vilakazi, visited the family to console them. She gifted the family food parcels, and money vouchers to buy necessities for the funeral, which will take place on Saturday. The MEC condemned gender-based violence and called for the law to prevail.
“As the department, we are also in pain to see such a young lady becoming another victim of gender-based violence. We call on communities to work with us so that we are able to stop these killings of women and children, we are going to also give support to this family through counselling, and anything that they may need during this difficult time,” said Vilakazi.
