Johannesburg - The North West High Court, sitting at the Ga-Rankuwa Regional Court, has sentenced Sbongiseni Njabulo Ngwenya, 24, to five life terms for rape and a cumulative 300 years, for other serious offences – that include housebreaking and robbery with aggravating circumstances.
Ngwenya was found guilty on 39 charges, of which 16 were for rape, nine for armed robbery, 13 for housebreaking, and one for attempted murder.
The court declared him unfit to possess a firearm, ordered he be registered in the register of sexual offenders, and he has been declared unsuitable to work with children.
Ngwenya was arrested in September 2018, following a series of crimes reported to the police by his victims.
Evidence in court revealed that Ngwenya broke into his victims’ homes at night, threatened them with a firearm, robbed them of TV sets, cellphones, and money, and then raped them, before fleeing the scene.
All the crimes were committed in the victims’ homes.
Three of his rape victims were minors, aged 12, 14 and 16, when they were violated. He was positively linked to the rape offences by DNA samples.
Police reports further revealed that, in some instances, Ngwenya was accompanied by Bongani Masuku, as he and his accomplice terrorised unsuspecting women in Klipgat and Winterveld, between 2016 and 2018.
Masuku is currently serving a life sentence for the same offences, and various other offences that he committed alone.
He turned state witness and testified about how he and Ngwenya went about committing the criminal acts.
Ngwenya initially denied knowing Masuku, but later conceded that Masuku was the mastermind behind all these offences, as he was only 18 years of age when these crimes were committed.
However, the state proved, through evidence presented, that Ngwenya committed some of the offences on his own, unaccompanied by his accomplice.
In aggravation of sentence, advocate McDonald Ndimande urged the court not to deviate from the minimum prescribed sentence on each of the offences, as the victims were violated in their homes, which they consider to be a place of safety. He further argued that the country is grappling with the scourge of gender-based violence, which needs to be addressed by the criminal justice system.
Judge Rose Nonyana concurred with the state and she alluded to the public outcry on the prevalence of rape, and said their hopes are pinned on the courts to deal with such cases and those of gender-based violence.
The Director of Public Prosecutions in the North West, Dr Rachel Makhari Sekhaolelo, lauded advocate Ndimande, Sergeant Moloantwa Rapakgadi, and Sergeant Cathrine Tladi from the SAPS, for their collaboration in securing a conviction
She said: “The hopes of our people are pinned on the criminal justice system to fight gender-based violence, and such convictions will be a deterrent to wannabe offenders.”
IOL