Canaan Mdletshe

Canaan Mdletshe

Police have launched a manhunt for a possible serial killer after the gruesome discovery of the decomposed bodies of three women in sugarcane plantations on the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast.

Two bodies were discovered at Shayamoya and the third at Esperanza in Umzinto.

Umzimkhulu police spokesman Superintendent Zandra Hechter said yesterday that a man had discovered the first two bodies on Sunday last week. One of the bodies had its head missing.

"On Sunday at about 10.40am a member of the community made a gruesome discovery when he discovered the decomposed bodies of two unknown females," Hechter said.

"A postmortem was conducted and showed that the women were strangled and possibly raped."

Hechter said that two days later, a dog was seen running around with a human head.

"The one female was then identified as Nombali Ngcobo of Inanda but we could not identify the other woman," she said.

Another body was discovered on Monday.

"The body was also in an advanced state of decomposition," Hechter said.

"The deceased was also strangled. We suspect that the murders have been committed by the same person as the modus operandi in all three cases is the same.

"We are following up certain leads that could shed light on the three murders ," Hechter said.