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20090803

Death of Cassandré van Rooyen solved

 

20080218 Controversial mystery of teen victim Cassandré van Rooyen (17), solved – two youths admit to culpible homicide in accidental shooting

Rooyen Cassandre van 17 Tarlton smallholding teen found murdered Aug 3 2009 – Two youths, Ken Maree, now 18, and an unidentified 15-year-old youth, today appeared in the Johannesburg High Court, submitting confessions regarding the mystery death of 17-year-old Afrikaner teen Cassandré van Rooyen, whose lifeless body was found on a smallholding on 18 February 2008 with a bullet-wound in the back of her head.

At the time, the news media claimed that the girl had been found ‘naked’, however this turned out to be inaccurate information.

The Van Rooyen girl’s mystery death created deep divisions within the local Afrikaner community this entire past year because two Afrikaans youths were arrested and charged shortly afterwards for her ‘murder’, with the police also publicly persisting in referring to the arrested 17-year-old youth as ‘a man’ and angry family members, describing him as a ‘social misfit’, also demanding that he be charged in a public court of law as an adult instead of behind closed doors in a youth court. 

However, it emerged today from the confessoin that then 17-year-old Ken Maree  had been an accessory to covering up the girl’s accidental death, and that the 15-year-old has now admitted to her culpible homicide.

The dead Afrikaner teen lived with the Maree family on the smallholding during the week, and always spent weekends in Alberton with her mother, Maria. it was reported at the time of her death.

Ken Maree on Monday admitted in a statement submitted to  the Johannesburg High Court statement to being an accessory to culpible homicide --  and the 15-year-old youth admitted in his statement to a charge of culpible homicide in the Johannesburg High Court on Monday.

Cassandré was a matric pupil and popular cheerleader at the Afrikaans Bekker High School in Magaliesburg, and was staying at the smallholding when she was shot under circumstances which still remain very murky.

Dressed in shorts and a top, the petite schoolgirl was found in an overgrown garden with a gaping gun-shot wound to the head.

Almost immediately after her death, Ken Maree, then 17, a former pupil at Van Rooyen’s school and a fifteen-year-old already were arrested and questioned by police in connection with her death and charged with murder, according to inspector Solomon Sibiya from the West Rand police, who very persistently referred to the Afrikaans 17-year-old as ‘a man”, was quoted at the time as saying:

Why did the police inspector refer to a 17-year-old as ‘a man?”

It’s still not clear why the youths were being charged with murder instead of being accused of the lesser charges of culpible homicide a year ago: Sibiya also told the news media at the time that the 15-year- old had actually confessed to shooting Van Rooyen by accident, but the boy’s lawyer, Karl Schüler, said at that time that he was not willing to comment on this.

On Monday, the youths’ signed confessions describing the circumstances of the girl’s tragic death, finally seem to be bringing this controversial case to an end.

Thus far all the proceedings were held in camera. Sean Haskins, a friend of Van Rooyen’s stepfather, Boet Jordaan, said: “We want justice. Cassandre was such a beautiful girl.” He said it was upsetting for Jordaan and for him ‘to sit through the proceedings and look at the teenagers accused of killing the popular matric girl.”

Jordaan Boet stepfather of murdered teen Cassandre van Rooyen pic Alon Skuy Since that time, two diametrically opposed support groups have also grown up around the case on the internet, with her stepfather Boet van Rooyen -- right on this picture by the Sunday Times of Johannesburg’s photographer Alon Skuy --  demanding that justice must be seen to be done – in public.

Investigating officer Captain Poen Muller also was quoted as saying just after her death that the Maree family, with whom she had been staying had reported her missing, at the Krugersdorp police station that Tuesday morning. Carl Maree said his family last saw Cassandre on Monday evening, doing her homework.

The entire story will be published in Beeld newspaper tomorrow by their investigative journalist Magdel Fourie.

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