Durban - Friends and family have gathered to pay their last respects to murdered Klawer teenager, Jerobejin van Wyk.
The 13-year-old's remains were found in a drain on a property earlier this month.
Van Wyk went missing after he told his mother, Triesha van Wyk, that he was going to pick mangoes in the upmarket side of town.
At the time, police said Daniel Smit, a local, accused the boy of stealing fruit at his property.
SAPS spokesperson, Colonel Andre Traut, said Smit initially alleged that he had chased the boy. However, it was later established that police found human remains in a drain on Smit's property.
DNA analysis conducted on the remains, a lung, ear and skin, confirmed that the remains belonged to van Wyk.
On Saturday, friends and family gathered in Klawer for Van Wyk’s funeral.
Smit faces charges including kidnapping and murder. Although Smit’s lawyer, Santie Human, revealed that Smit’s actions were due to past occult links, but he is yet to make a formal confession. Smit apparently used to belonged to an occult group which no longer exists.
Smit told the media he was allegedly driven by evil spirits to kill Jerobejin after the boy stole mangoes.
Weighing in on the murder and Smit's apparent 'confession', Reverend Tristan Kapp of the South African Satanic Church, said Smit's statement threatened to mask the true nature of a South African murder crime, through the stigma of alternative minority religious perspectives.
IOL