‘I strangled oupa for drug money’: Skelm confesses to 2020 murder, jailed for 15 years
Tears flowed at the Wynberg Regional Court on Friday as a heartless skelm confessed to the horrific murder of a 83-year-old oupa from Manenberg.
Nearly two years after the body of William Lambert was found inside his workshop the suspect, Damian van Niekerk, 24, finally admitted he strangled the elderly man with an electric cord in July 2020 after he was caught stealing.
Lambert is the grandfather of murdered teen Elene Lino.
At the time, Elene and her sister Candice Baartman, 26, revealed that a woman had come to their oupa that morning asking him to fix a TV.
Later in the day, they became worried when they did not see Lambert and broke the front door of his workshop, where he was found strangled and his pockets turned out.
Manenberg Police went on a manhunt for Van Niekerk but members of the Hard Livings gang caught up with him first.
Van Niekerk suffered head injuries as skollies dragged him through the street and klapped and trapped on him.
They later handed him over to police and he was charged with murder.
Van Niekerk returned to court last week where he pleaded guilty to the charges, admitting he had broken into the workshop to steal from William to fuel his drug habit.
William’s daughter, Avril Carelse, 45, tells Daily Voice: “On Wednesday the state prosecutor called me and said he was going to plead guilty and asked if I wanted to sit in and I said yes.
“I heard his lawyer read out the statement where he said he killed my father because my father caught him breaking in.
“He told the court that he had a drug problem and wanted scrap to sell to feed his drug habit. He even told them that he used the cord of the fan to strangle him.
“He must have also taken the money because the week before my father died, I took him to withdraw his SASSA money and he had all that money on him.
“He even slept with his money in his pockets.”
Van Niekerk was sentenced to 15 years in the mang and was told he would be eligible for parole in 10 years as he was a first-time offender.
Avril says as they led him down in the dock, he turned to her.
“He took off his mask and asked me for forgiveness. I couldn’t talk, I just cried,” she says.
“Even if he had gotten life in prison, it would not have brought my father back.
“I can’t say how Elene would have felt about the sentence.”
monique.duval@inl.co.za