‘Murder accused pointed gun at me’
A security guard has testified how a man who regularly met his girlfriend outside her workplace pointed a gun at him moments before he heard that the woman had been killed.
|||Pretoria - ”I heard shots, next thing he pointed his gun at me and shouted at me to f****** open the gate’.” This was the evidence of a security guard working at Manage All Solutions in Moreleta Park, who took the stand on Tuesday to testify in the murder trial of Dawie Connoway.
The 38-year-old Connoway is facing an array of charges, including murdering his former girlfriend in the parking lot of the business.
He is also facing a charge of pointing a firearm at security guard Peter Makola.
Connoway pleaded not guilty in the high court in Pretoria without a plea explanation. The prosecution on Tuesday told Judge Vivian Tlhapi it is not clear what Connoway’s defence is, but it seems to be that he did not intentionally pull the trigger which killed Nicolene Schreuder on the morning of April 29 last year.
She died on the scene of multiple gunshot wounds.
While she was lying on the ground in a pool of blood, Connoway sped off on his motorbike. His mother Elize Fourie harboured him on her farm outside Pretoria, where she hid him in a walk-in safe from the police.
She was earlier given a suspended sentence for obstructing justice.
Connoway was arrested a day after the killing. The incident shocked the employees of the Manage All Solutions, where Schreuder worked as the personal assistant of the chief executive.
Makola became emotional as he testified. He said Connoway was a familiar face at the office, but he never entered the premises.
He usually waited outside under a tree for Schreuder and either asked him to call her or phoned her to meet him.
On that fateful day he entered the premises and met Schreuder in the parking lot.
Makola was washing Schreuder’s car when he heard gunshots.
“I saw him emerging from the side of a door with a gun in his hands.”
Makola said he ran away when Connoway pointed the firearm at him and ordered him to open the gate.
“I heard people shouting that he had shot Nicolene and I then saw her lying on the ground.”
Connoway, through his lawyer, denied he pointed a firearm at Makola and said he simply gestured with it to the man to open the gate.
He also said that he was the one who wanted to end the relationship and that it was Schreuder who invited him to her office that day.
Connoway has remained in custody since the shooting.
zelda.venter@inl.co.za
Pretoria News