Teenager recalls rape ordeal

One of the four De Deur girls kidnapped on Monday has told of how they were stripped naked, raped and beaten up for seven hours.

Three of the girls were held hostage at a neglected plot in the Vanderbijlpark, south of Johannesburg, but released later while the fourth girl was only allowed to leave the next day.

A 15-year-old girl relived her ordeal to Sowetan yesterday.

"We were walking back from school through a plot between our school and home when this guy walked past us.

"He turned around when he was a few metres away and asked us why we were laughing at him. He pulled out a knife and said that he will teach us a lesson before instructing us to go deeper into the veld," said the distraught teenager.

She said they were paralysed by fear and could not shout for help and that the assailant further told them that he had a gun in his possession which he would use if they made a noise.

"He told us to take off our clothes and wrapped our jerseys around our heads and took turns with us," she said.

The assailant then allowed the three girls to leave in the evening but took the fourth teenager to a house in the vicinity.

One of the girls' parents told Sowetan that he was shocked, traumatised and angry. The parent, who also cannot be named to protect the minors, said he could have prevented the ordeal from taking place.

He said he saw the group of girls walking home while he drove in the opposite direction moments before they were kidnapped.

"I hooted to make them aware that I saw them... I wouldn't have known that something like this would happen, because they always use that route when school ends early," he said.

He said he became concerned when he returned home after a few hours and realised that his daughter had not arrived.

He said he was plunged into fear when he received a text informing him that his daughter and friends were held captive.

"I contacted one of the other parents and together with the community, we went to the area where I last saw them. My daughter and her two friends were already in the neighbourhood, so we started a search party for the fourth girl," he said.

"Some community members and the police spotted the suspect in a neighbouring area, but he managed to evade capture," he said.

Thato Moemi, a community member who was part of the search party, appealed to the police to find the suspect as he has allegedly been behind a string of criminal activities in the area.

"This is unheard of. We hope he is found because we don't want to live with an animal in our community," Moemi said.

Police spokesperson Col Lungelo Dlamini said no arrests had been made but police were following up on a few leads and were hopeful that they would apprehend the suspect.