Cape Town - Three suspects are expected to apply for bail in the Paarl Magistrate’s Court after a harrowing video surfaced on social media showing how they tortured a 9-year-old boy accused of stealing money.
The child suffered several minutes of torture as both his wrists were tied to a metal saw handle while a man used jumper cables connected to a vehicle battery to shock him.
This while another doused him with water.
The incident happened in Klapmuts on January 27, after the boy was accused of stealing R600.
While more than five people were captured in the video, police arrested and charged three men – Justin Limco, 21, Nathan Niewenhuis, 24, and Zane Marthinus, 34.
The six-minute-long video starts with someone talking about money while the boy stands against a white car. The people in the yard could be heard laughing and making comments like: “Tie him up, make it tight.”
This, as the boy screams out for his mother.
“Are you going to speak the truth now, huh?” a man’s voice asks.
“Are you going to steal again? Are you still not going to talk?”
A man in a white vest then takes the steel handle to which the boy’s wrists are tied, and pushes it behind his neck. A woman is heard saying that the victim was not crying, and the torturer asks the boy whether he was.
The 9-year-old whimpers and the suspects burst out laughing.
Eventually a suspect says the car battery is flat and tells the boy to wait as he walks out of the frame.
A female voice tells the tormentor to leave the child, it’s enough.
But another man then drags the boy and the camera exposes that there are many people sitting and watching as the punishment transpires.
The helpless child is then lifted up and placed head first into a wheelie bin, which is then closed.
His harrowing screams can be heard as the man in the vest asks someone to bring water.
As the suspects cut the cables, freeing his wrists, a woman says: “Do you see what happens to people who steal money? Do you see? You did this to yourself.”
After the cables were removed the boy was pushed back into the bin and a woman filming with her smartphone orders the suspects to hit the bin, which then had bricks placed on the lid. They put a hosepipe in the bin and poured water into it.
The woman holding the camera keeps laughing, saying: “Lekker, he swims in the dam so he can hold his head under the water.” The clip then ends but the boy’s neighbour told the Cape Argus that after the ordeal the boy was removed from the area.
Police spokesperson, André Traut confirmed three suspects were being detained following their arrest on a charge of assault with the intent to cause grievous bodily harm.