Christopher Panayiotou and his two co-accused, Sizwezakhe Vumazonke and Sinethemba Nenembe are expected to appear in the Port Elizabeth High Court for a pre-trial conference on Tuesday.
Panayiotou is accused of orchestrating the murder of his schoolteacher wife‚ Jayde, in April last year, allegedly because she was a “financial burden”. The trial has been set down for October 3 until December 2.
In June, the same court ruled that murder-accused Christopher Panayiotou would remain behind bars after Magistrate Abigail Beeton ruled his defence team presented the court with no new facts to warrant a new bail application.
It is alleged that he paid a bouncer at his Infinity night club, Luthando Siyoni, to hire hitman Sizwezakhe Vumazonke to kidnap and murder his wife.
Siyoni has since become a section 204 witness which means that he is indemnified from prosecution if the court is satisfied at the end of the trial that he testified honestly.
The State alleged that Nenembe assisted Vumazonke to kidnap and kill Jayde at the behest of her husband. He has been imprisoned at the St Albans prison for more than a year.
On July 22, a fifth suspect arrested in connection with the murder of Jayde appeared in the Port Elizabeth’s Magistrate’s Court. Zolani Sibeko was arrested after police used cellphone plotting which placed him at the scene of the Stellen Glen complex where the alleged kidnapping took place.
South Africa Today – South Africa News
