25 year sentence for Fort Hare student murderer

Convicted murderer, Alutha Pasile, who was found guilty of brutally killing and dismembering the body of 23-year-old Fort Hare student Nosicelo Mtebeni has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for her murder.

Pasile, 25, was sentenced in the East London High Court on Thursday after pleading guilty to her murder and to attempting to defeat the ends of justice on Monday.

He was sentenced to a further ten years in prison for the second charge.

Pasile claimed in his guilty plea that he had found text messages on Mtebeni’s cellphone which led to him attacking her during a confrontation.

National Prosecuting Authority Senior State Advocate Nickie Turner said although Pasile pleaded guilty, he still showed a lack of remorse for her murder.

“He had no choice but to plead guilty to both counts in view of the fact that the hands and head of the deceased were found in his flat together with the equipment purchased by him for the purposes of dismembering her.

“[Mtebeni] was reduced…to a mere thing that was going to be cut for the self-serving purpose of avoiding detection. His self-interest and lack of empathy at her death is blood chilling and grotesque,” Turner said.

Meanwhile, the Commission for Gender Equality’s chairperson Tamara Mathebula welcomed the sentence and urged courts to mete out justice with “speed and efficiency” in cases involving gender based violence and femicide.

“South Africa is experiencing unprecedented levels of violence against women and girls, and this calls for aggressive and speedy resolution of police investigations and court cases.

“With just less than ten years left before 2030 and the GBV scourge escalating at the current pace, South Africa will likely miss the Sustainable Development Goal target [to end gender based violence by 2030] and that will be a poor reflection of the country’s efforts in the fight against violence on women. That would render the country’s commemoration of Women’s Month and 16 Days of Activism as useless,” Mathebula said.