Former Houtbay basketball coach sentenced to life for murder of 12-year-old boy

The Western Cape High Court on Wednesday sentenced a former basketball coach from Houtbay, to life imprisonment for murder.

Marvin Minnaar was found guilty of the 2020 murder of 12-year-old Sibusiso Dakuse from Imizamo Yethu. The boy’s body was found a few days after he went missing.

PICTURE: Pixabay

Minnaar was the coach of the Hout Bay Snipers basketball team and coached the deceased. He stayed near the deceased’s home in Imizamo Yethu, Hout Bay. Dakuse went missing on the afternoon of 26 February 2020. Witness statements showed that the deceased, who stayed with his grandmother, was last seen alive in the presence of the accused around 7 pm that day, 26 February 2020. The following day, his grandmother reported him missing at the Hout Bay Police Station. This led to a widespread search involving the police and the community, and the accused also helped to look for him, although he knew that he had kidnapped, raped, and killed him.

The accused and his stepfather even went to the deceased’s house to enquire whether he had been found. He confirmed that he did see and walk with the deceased but parted ways close to the Hout Bay Police Station. He kept his lie even to the deceased’s grieving father, who enquired about his son’s disappearance. Police found the deceased’s naked body lying face down in the reeds of a wetland off a horse trail two days after his disappearance. They arrested the accused later that day. CCTV footage showed the deceased desperately attempting to flee from the accused and him speedily chasing, catching, and dragging the boy back into the bushes. Medical evidence revealed that he had a contusion in the anal area, and his neck had ligature marks around it. The postmortem report revealed that he died of strangulation and that the rest of his body had multiple abrasions and a blunt-force injury to his left eye.

Minaar has been deemed a danger to society.

 ‘’The court sentenced Minnaar to 8 years direct imprisonment for kidnapping, life imprisonment for rape and life imprisonment for murder. It ordered his sentence for kidnapping to run concurrently with the two life sentences. It declared him unfit to possess a firearm and unfit to work with children. It ordered his name to be recorded in the National Child Protection Register and the National Sexual Offenders Register,’’ said Eric Ntabazalila, National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson in the Western Cape.

‘’In her judgment, Judge Nziweni read a clinical psychologist’s report, Abbas, who was part of a panel constituted in terms of Section 286A of the Criminal Procedure Act, 1977, to determine whether the accused was a dangerous criminal. The report showed that Minnaar was evasive when answering questions and did not provide any detailed explanation regarding his actions on the day of the offences. He reported to the clinical psychologist that he did not realise the extent to which he choked the deceased and that he felt rejected by the deceased. He has antisocial personality traits with a history of problems with authority figures, trouble with the law and violating social norms with no regard for the consequences thereof.’’

‘’He has the presence of psychopathic and anti-social personality disorder traits, which were contributing factors to his offending. The report concluded that the accused poses and may continue to pose a serious ongoing threat to victims of similar victimology. Most of his risk factors are static, and he is not open to change, he minimised the offences for which he was convicted and exhibited superficial remorse and a lack of empathy. He posed a danger to the physical well-being of other people. Although the court agreed with the panel that the accused was a dangerous criminal as per Section 286A of the Criminal Procedure Act, 1977, it declined to declare him as dangerous as doing so may lead to the court finding substantial and compelling circumstances that justify deviation from the prescribed minimum sentences. The court found that there were no substantial and compelling circumstances which justify it deviating from the prescribed minimum sentences,’’ concluded Ntabazalila.

 

Done By: Mitchum George