Woman 'strangles' sick husband

A 53-year-old woman who strangled to death her terminally ill live-in husband after getting fed up with his state of health, heaved a temporary sigh of relief after she was granted bail by the High Court here yesterday.

Florence Mazhanga of 2310 Mahatshula North suburb was granted $100 bail when she appeared before High Court Judge Justice Kamocha facing murder charges.

Mazhanga, who is denying the charge, will return to court on October 22.

The State alleges that the now deceased Lucas Nyathi was living alone at number 3 New Luveve suburb after the death of his first wife Alice in 2009.

Sometime in 2011, the deceased's daughter Christine based in South Africa approached Mazhanga to assist her father as a maid, a job she kindly accepted.

While they were living together, the two fell in love and started cohabiting.

The court heard that in the same year, the deceased suffered a stroke which left his left side of the body completely paralysed.

As a result, the deceased was unable to do anything by himself to such an extent that he would soil himself while the accused would clean and bath him.

As time went by, the late Nyathi's health deteriorated to a level where the accused was now sleeping in a spare bedroom due to the stench the deceased emitted, the court heard.

The accused would sometimes assault Nyathi with sticks for messing himself and neighbours occasionally came to his rescue.

Fed up with the illness, Mazhanga hatched a plan to kill her husband so that she could inherit his house since she was the only living spouse.

In May this year, the accused entered the bed-ridden Nyathi's bedroom and allegedly strangled him to death using her hands.

After that, she locked all the doors at the house including the gate and left the place.

She reportedly returned home the same day in the evening then pretended to be shocked by the discovery that her husband had passed away by screaming for help.

Neighbours flocked in before a police report was made.

However, the accused was not lucky as the police observed that the deceased had some bruises and a swollen neck.

There was no indication of a break-in at the house.

A week later, post-mortem results revealed that, the deceased had died "due to  facial cyanosis, subconguctive haemorrhage, bruises and thump impression on the right and left side of the deceased's neck and a broken trachea."