People gather near Parliament to highlight the country’s high incidence of rape and call on President Jacob Zuma to take urgent action to address this crisis while Minister of Finance Gordhan presented his budget to Parliament in Cape Town, South Africa, on Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. A South African court on Wednesday denied bail to a man accused of the rape and murder of a teenage girl who died hours after she was brutally mutilated. AP IMAGES FOR AVAAZ
CAPE TOWN—A South African court has denied bail to a man accused of the rape and murder of a teenage girl who died hours after she was brutally mutilated.
Jonathan Davids, 22, denied guilt in the February 2 attack on Anene Booysen, 17, but was refused bail in the small town of Bredasdorp where the teenager was attacked.
“There would have been a huge outcry if he was granted bail,” Eric Ntabazalila, regional spokesman for the National Prosecuting Authority told AFP on Wednesday.
As she lay dying in hospital, Booysen named Davids as having attacked her with “about five to six” friends in a case that shocked even this rape-weary nation.
Booysen suffered gruesome injuries and was found with her internal organs hanging outside her body on a construction site in the town around 180 kilometres (105 miles) east of Cape Town.
“The intestines came out through her reproductive organs,” said Ntabazalila.
A second accused, Johannes Kana, 21, has confessed to raping and assaulting Booysen but not to her murder. He has not yet applied for bail.
“He did not confess to murder,” Ntabazalila added.
Clothing and a pair of sneakers, with signs of blood and semen, have been sent for forensic tests.
The police investigation is continuing.
Booysen’s murder and rape sparked an outcry in South Africa where around 65,000 sexual offenses are committed a year, according to official figures.
She was attacked after visiting a pub and found by a security guard at a construction site. She later died in hospital.
The case has been postponed until April.