Suspect found guilty of setting fire to and murdering gay man
A man who brutally killed his victim for being gay has been found guilty of murder.
Christo Oncke was found guilty of killing Dawid Olyne in Cape Town.
On being handed down the sentence by Judge Siraj Desai, Oncke bust out laughing, shocking the Cerese Magistrate’s Court.
A psychological evaluation was called for by the judge before sentencing due to erratic behaviour throughout his testimony.
Oncke said he got angry when Olyne “came onto him”, and touched him.
Oncke during the trial
Despite admitting that he fought with the victim, Oncke said he left him alive on 22 March 2014.
The court also heard that the 29-year-old set Olyne alight.
There were also seventeen witnesses in the case who testified that Oncke bragged that he was going to kill a “moffie”, a derogatory term for a gay man.
“By his own words he had assaulted [Olyne]. He said he was sexually attacked by Olyne and that caused him to react the way he did. He meant to hurt him and this points to it being a hate crime,” said Desai.
“I find you guilty of murder,” the judge said, calling the incident “a crime of hate”.
Members of the Triangle Project, an anti-homophobia charity, said they were happy that the judge had use the term “crime of hate”, but that they thought Oncke had accomplices who have been allowed to go free.
Sharon Cox from the project, said: “It is unfortunate the other people who killed Dawid are free and Oncke has been left to take it all upon himself.”
Other gay rights activists have said the victim was raped before he was murdered, and that the charge should have also been included.
