EASTERN CAPE - ELDERLY MAN FOUND MURDERED AND ROBBED IN HIS JEFFREYS BAY HOME

A 79-year-old man was found murdered inside his Jeffreys Bay home at about 8pm on Tuesday.

According to police, Johannes Marx was found bound to a chair in the bedroom after security officials kicked open the front door or his home in Pride of India Crescent in Wavecrest, Jeffreys Bay.

Investigators said a preliminary investigation showed no signs of forced entry to the house.

Police spokesperson Sergeant  Majola Nkohli said a relative living out of town could not get hold of Marx and had called the local security company to ask them to take a look.

 “On their arrival, the house was locked up and attempts to gain entry failed,” Nkohli said.

“The family gave permission for the security guard to kick the door open and Marx was found in the bedroom.”

Officials confirmed that there were no signs of blood and Nkohli said it was suspected Marx had either been suffocated or strangled during the attack.

The safe was opened but it is  not known if anything was stolen.

Nkohli said should the murder appear to have been motivated by robbery, an additional charge of robbery would  be added to the murder charge.

Jeffreys Bay response company Smhart Security, which was on the scene, failed to respond to questions by the time of publication.

Marx’s daughter is specialist state prosecutor Zelda Swanepoel, 45, who works in the Port Elizabeth director of public prosecutions’ office.

Swanepoel deals mainly with cases relating to sexual offences and human trafficking and due to the nature of her work, she works closely with the Hawks.

Officials who work with Swanepoel confirmed that Marx was her father.

Several attempts to get hold of her failed.

According to insiders, the Hawks were on the scene to oversee the case and to ascertain if the murder was possibly linked to any ongoing case Swanepoel was working on.

Detectives later confirmed that there were no known links to pending cases.

Eastern Cape Hawks spokesperson Captain Anelisa Ngcakani said the case would not be taken over by their unit but they would assist with the probe if needed.

via - HERALDLIVE