SOUTH AFRICA: Teen will deny killing white supremacist TerreBlanche

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REPORTING FROM JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA — A South African teen will deny killing white supremacist Eugene TerreBlanche, who was found dead at 69 on his farm last year after being brutally beaten, the teen’s lawyer told the nation’s High Court on Monday as the trial opened.

The defendant, whose identity is confidential under South African law, is charged along with an adult, Chris Mahlangu, in the killing. Both Mahlangu and the teenager were employed as farm workers by TerreBlanche. The teenager, 15 at the time of the killing, was a herdsman for the militant’s 97 cattle.

The killing occurred in a dispute over wages, according to the prosecution. Both defendants are black.

TerreBlanche founded a pro-apartheid paramilitary group, the Afrikaner Resistance Movement, that was prominent in the 1970s and ‘80s but was a spent force by the time of his death.

The youth’s attorney, Norman Arendse, told the High Court in Ventersdorp that the boy was terrified of TerreBlanche, saying the white supremacist abused him physically and verbally, often swearing at him. The attorney said there were also allegations his client was a victim of sex abuse.

Arendse said the minor had entered TerreBlanche’s home on the day of the slaying, but the victim was already dead.

‘On the day in question ... the accused did enter the house of the deceased through an open window. ... He was able to say that the deceased had already been killed and this will explain why some blood was found on his clothes. He will deny that he participated in the killing of the deceased, he will deny that he robbed the deceased or sold any items belonging to the deceased, and he will deny attempting to steal the car belonging to the deceased,’ Arendse told the court, according to the South African Press Assn.

Police officer Klaas Nkathule testified that he received a call from a minor on April 3, 2010, the day of the killing, at dusk. A boy told him that he and a friend had killed TerreBlanche because they had not been paid for a day’s work.

The boy told him that they were hiding, afraid of being killed in revenge, the press association reported.

‘I asked where he was calling from. ... He said we are hiding in a camp near a farm. He said we want to come to the police station, but we are afraid of whites from other farms, as they may find us and kill us,’ Nkathule told the court.

Arendse said the minor was being exploited by TerreBlanche as child labor and should have been in school. He said the teenager lived in appalling conditions on the farm.

Arendse said the teenager has received part payment for his day’s work and had no dispute with TerreBlanche at the time of the killing.

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— Robyn Dixon

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