[This is actually much more vicious and disgusting than the title suggests. This is what criminals did to their victims – among other things. Jan]

Two men stand accused of attacking an elderly Malmesbury couple in their home and embarking on a drug-fuelled rape orgy against their teenage daughter, her two friends and a woman who boarded with the family.

Shocking testimony before the Cape High Court revealed that the women were repeatedly raped and sodomised before being forced to carry the goods their accused rapists had stolen to a street 15 minutes away.

One of the women was sexually assaulted with a gun, after she told her attackers that she was menstruating.

The young women were so traumatised by the midnight attack that they could only testify via television, but accused rapists Ricardo Pietersen and Francisco Leander have insisted that the alleged rapes were consensual sexual encounters.

It appears from court papers that the accused had been drinking alcohol and smoking Mandrax before the attack.

Pietersen claimed that he and Leander had been invited to the house where the rapes took place and said the duo had squeezed through a window when one of the women failed to let them in.

He claimed that the charges against him and Leander were part of a revenge plot against them by one of the rape survivors, who he said had tried and failed to previously have him prosecuted for rape.

Both men have pleaded not guilty to eight rape charges and one count of robbery with aggravating circumstances.

In addition, Leander has pleaded not guilty to attempted indecent assault and Pietersen has denied that he is guilty of another charge of indecent assault.

The state, represented by advocate Ilse Taylor, alleges that the attack happened shortly after midnight in January 2003, when the mother of one of the victims went outside to bring in the washing from the line.

The woman had put the washing down and turned to close her kitchen door when she was confronted by a man, his face covered by a plastic bag, who pushed a gun in her face.

Behind him stood a shorter man, also with a plastic bag on his face, clutching a panga.

After failing to get any money from the woman or her husband, the state alleges the two men forced their way into the bedroom where the couple’s daughter and her friends were sleeping.

The couple’s boarder was also woken up and brought to the girls’ bedroom.

Evidence before the court revealed that the elderly man was then taken to another room, tied up and a bed was thrown on top of him.

His frantic wife, who was trying to look after her two young grandchildren, was forced to helplessly witness the horror attacks.

“(The rape survivors) were then raped one by one. One of the victims was sodomised by Pietersen.

“Leander tried to indecently assault (one of the rape survivors) by sticking his gun into her vagina,” the state allege.

The rape survivors said Pietersen and Leander had gathered various items from the house, including a television set, kitchen equipment and jewellery.

After the rapes, which were committed at gunpoint, the men instructed their victims to carry the goods for them.

Judgment will be delivered on August 22.

This article was originally published on page 3 of Cape Argus on August 12, 2005

Source: Independent Online (IOL)
URL: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click…/p>