Cape Town - A father accused of killing his stepdaughter and stabbing her through the side of her head appeared in the Western Cape High Court on Wednesday, where the trial commenced.
Xolelani Mjada pleaded not guilty to four counts of murder, rape, robbery with aggravating circumstances and housebreaking. As part of his formal admissions, Mjada, through his lawyer, Office Mtini, said, “I admit that the deceased was known to me, she was my stepdaughter as I was married to her mother.”
The State alleged that on November 9, 2020 in the evening, Mjada broke into Yonela Kopana’s home where she stayed with her mother, Phumeza Kopana, and brother in Swartberg Street, Wellington.
He allegedly stabbed and assaulted the 17-year-old, robbing her of her cellphone.
That night, Mjada was seen by neighbours leaving their home as he climbed through a window. At the time, a court order prohibited Mjada from entering the Kopanas’ home.
Forensic pathologist Dr Deidré Abrahams concluded the cause of death to be “manual strangulation”, noting a sharp incision, 13mm in length through the left side of Yonela’s head, could have contributed to her death. She said that there were no signs that Yonela had been forcefully sexually penetrated.
She said, “The linear abrasions may have been incurred with a soft object or clothing object overlying the anterior neck. I want to explain that the soft object may be between the hand and her neck, so that it’s not a ligature abrasion of a string or a rope or a tie but it’s a hand over a soft object.”
She added that wounds on the teenager’s fingers, showed that she tried to defend herself, “The right hand, third and fourth fingers have abrasions, these may be consistent with self defence injuries,” Abrahams said.
Abrahams testimony followed that of police officer Alex Heradine who sketched out the scene where Yonela was found on November 10, 2020.
“I went to the scene at Swartberg Street, where a group of people stopped me. They showed me a shack where the door was open. I went in and in the bedroom I saw a young girl lying on the ground. She lay on her back, just in front of the bed. I noticed she was not breathing, I went out, pushed the door closed and then I called the necessary people.”
When State advocate Bonginkosi Maki asked if anyone was at the house, he said, “If I can remember correctly, the deceased’s mother was standing at the door but there was no one inside the house.”