Murder suspect may be serial killer

A 32-year-old Free State man, who is accused of murdering two of his girlfriends, is suspected of committing five other murders.

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Bloemfontein - A 32-year-old man appeared in the Kestell Magistrate’s court in the Free State on Wednesday on a double charge of murder.

Lentsha Molefe, from Lesotho, was arrested on Monday after the bodies of his two girlfriends, both of whom lived with him, were exhumed from a shallow grave.

Police investigators believe Molefe could be a serial killer and are investigating a possible connection to a further five murder cases.

Free State police spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Thandi Mbambo said the bodies were found on the Geduld farm in the Kestell district.

Mbambo said that on October 21 “one of the community members at the farm was searching for scrap metals in the bushes when he came across two shallow graves opposite one another, and there was a foul smell coming from the graves. He went to call other community members and they opened one grave, where they saw what looked like a human body wrapped in a blanket, and then they summoned the police”.

She said police exhumed the bodies and they were identified as Nomvula Mkhwanazi, 26, from Reitz and Dieketso Lefatsa, 17, from Butha-Buthe in Lesotho.

Mbambo said both bodies were found with ropes around their necks “which suggests that they could have been strangled, but post mortem results will provide a precise cause of death”.

Its believed that Mkhwanazi may have been murdered in August and Lefatsa in September.

The matter was postponed to 4 November.

ANA

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