’Marafaele Mohloboli
THE police are close to solving the April 2017 murder of 33-year-old Lebohang Sekobi who was found dead with gunshot wounds at Ha Seeiso close to Metolong Dam in the Maseru district.
Mr Sekobi’s body was found in his car bleeding from the mouth and the nose on the evening of 12 April 2017 but the murder has never been solved.
Sources close to the investigations told the Lesotho Times this week that the police recently exhumed the late Mr Sekobi’s body for ballistics investigations. They reportedly removed the bullets that were embedded in the body but were never taken out when he was buried.
The investigators are now waiting for the ballistics results to determine whether or not the bullets that killed him match with those from the alleged murder weapon.
The body was kept at a Sekamaneng funeral parlour for the duration of the ballistics investigation and was reburied on Friday at Ha ‘Matanki.
Police spokesperson, Superintendent Mpiti Mopeli, confirmed that the investigations on the case were underway.
“Police investigations are still on-going and those responsible for the crime will be brought to book once the probe is completed,” Supt Mopeli said.
Indications are that on the evening of 12 April 2017, Mr Sekobi was on his way to visit his wife in Maseru. As he passed Ha Seeiso, the soldiers that were manning a roadblock in the area flagged him down.
He reportedly failed to stop but reduced speed. However, one of the officers fired a volley of bullets at his car and he lost control and plunged into a nearby maize field.
The body was later recovered in his white Opel Astra bleeding from the mouth and the nose by nearby villagers who reported the matter to the police.
Police officers who attended to the scene took the body to Flight One Police Station that evening and later took it to a Lesotho Funeral Services mortuary at ’Mantšebo.
However, there was no immediate clue about the identity of the assailants.
The soldiers reportedly visited the scene the next morning and collected all the bullet shells so that they could not be linked to the crime. The soldiers had been deployed to man a roadblock in the area after a robbery that had taken place in the area earlier.
Shortly afterwards, eyewitnesses from the area reportedly came forward with information that resulted in the launch of the investigation.
The sources said the scanning of the bullets was done on 27 June 2018 and further investigations are to follow.
