Albert van Vuuren, who is accused of killing his wife, says he does not recall anything.
|||He does not recall anything. One moment he was speaking to his wife and the next he woke up in a police cell with a deep cut to his hand and another on his head.
This was the explanation of a Bronkhorstspruit man, Albert van Vuuren, who is accused of killing his wife Monica.
The body of the petite woman, who weighed 43kg, was found on the kitchen floor of the family’s cottage on a farm outside the town.
The murder scene was earlier described by witnesses as covered in blood. Police said the kitchen was “drenched” in blood, while the passage walls, bedrooms and bathroom were also full of blood.
A pathologist said the person who had killed Monica on July 11, 2010, appeared to have “lost it”, as it was an extremely brutal killing and excessive force was used.
The woman was stabbed 25 times. Various fatal wounds were inflicted on her.
Her neck and jawbone were broken and her spinal cord dislocated.
Police found the accused sitting in the kitchen among all the blood, staring at his dead wife.
He told a female officer that he had killed his wife, but the next day he told another policeman that he did not kill her.
Taking the stand in the Pretoria High Court on Thursday, Van Vuuren was adamant that he was not the killer. “I did not commit the murder. I would have remembered if I killed her, but I know, I’m not a murderer.”
Van Vuuren said he was not even cross with his wife, although she wanted to divorce him. “I was in fact happy that she wanted a divorce, as it would have meant that she would go her own way and I did not need to take care of her.”
He said they were married for 10 years, five of which were “loveless”. They only remained together as she had nowhere to go.
Van Vuuren said shortly before he blacked out and later came to his senses in the police station, he had taken a sleeping tablet.
This was given to him by his lodger, Gordon McCallum, who suffered from bipolar disorder. McCallum insisted he had to take the tablet, Van Vuuren said.
The accused went to the kitchen to speak to his wife who was making food. The last thing he could remember was leaving the kitchen.
He said when he came to his senses the next day in the police cells, he was still wearing the same clothes as the previous night.
Van Vuuren said there was some blood on his jacket and shoes, but not much. The police later found a jacket in the house, “dripping with blood”. McCallum told the court it belonged to Van Vuuren. But he said he had given the jacket to McCallum to wear.
Van Vuuren said when he came to the next morning, McCallum was at the police cells and repeatedly told him, “remember, you killed your wife.”
Van Vuuren said the man in fact pitched up at the cells several times after that and kept telling him to “remember he had killed his wife.”
“I kept on saying I did not.”
Van Vuuren said a few hours after the incident, he went back to the house with the police to look for the murder weapon.
When he got there McCallum came out of the kitchen – which was earlier covered in blood but was now all cleaned up. This was before police could conduct their forensic investigation.
(Proceeding)
Pretoria News