Two serial rapists were found guilty and sentenced to a combined five life terms imprisonment and 145 years imprisonment for crimes committed against women and children. The duo, David Frank Lebjane age 35 and Sipho Guilt Shabangu aged 29, terrorised women between the ages of 15 and 40 at Vosman, Middelburg and Kabokweni respectively.
Lebjane who hails from Maviljan near Bushbuckridge, was sentenced by the Circuit of the Pretoria High Court in Delmas to 4 life terms imprisonment and 125 years imprisonment on eight counts of rape, five for robbery with aggravating circumstances, housebreaking and theft.
The court heard that Lebjane operated in Vosman and Middelburg from 2012 to 2015. His modus operandi would be to break into his victims’ houses, point them with a firearm demanding cellphones and then rape them. In his reign of terror, he raped four girls aged between 14 to 16 years. He was sentenced to one life term imprisonment for each count of rape. For the other four counts of rape Lebjane was given 20 years for each count. The accused was further sentenced to 40 years for five counts of robbery and five years for housebreaking and theft.
The other rapist, Shabangu, from Kabokweni, was on 24 May 2017, sentenced to life term imprisonment and 18 years imprisonment on two counts of rape and two years for assault with the intent to cause grievous bodily harm (GBH) by the Circuit of the Pretoria High Court in Nelspruit.
Shabangu targeted young women who were well known to him.
The Provincial Commissioner of the South African Police Service in Mpumalanga Lieutenant General Mondli Zuma praised the members for their sterling work in the investigation.
South Africa Today – South Africa News
