Uitenhage pupil, 14, dies after friendly cricket game turns nasty

A friendly cricket game in Uitenhage between two groups of children took a deadly turn when one of the boys was fatally stabbed – allegedly by an epileptic older player who had rushed home to get knives after being taunted by the younger players.

The tragedy occurred on Tuesday afternoon after the game in Gerald Smith Township, when the teams engaged in some teasing, which escalated into insults and ridicule.

Uitenhage High School Grade 8 pupil John Luke Agulhas, 14, died in the Uitenhage Provincial Hospital at about 3pm the same day, after he was stabbed in the chest with a peeling knife, allegedly by an 18-year-old, who was arrested shortly afterwards.

Agulhas had been staying at his 85-yearold grandmother, Cornelia Petersen’s, house over the school holidays when the cricket encounter took place.

Agulhas and the alleged assailant were part of a group of about 15 children – mostly aged between seven and 14 – from Gerald Smith who had congregated at their daily cricket spot in the veld behind McCarthy Street.

According to a witness, after Agulhas and his teammates lost the match, they began to taunt the 18-year-old and two of his friends, insulting them and ridiculing him for being the only youngster of that age still playing with children.

He then ran to his grandmother’s home in Abbot Road – about 400m away – while being chased by the group who continued teasing him.

A 13-year-old girl in the group, who is a friend of Agulhas’s, said they had returned cricket equipment to one of the houses in Abbot Road when they passed the 18-year-old, who was wielding a peeling knife and bread knife.

The girl said that while the rest of the group had run away, Agulhas and two friends stood their ground and Agulhas was stabbed.

Although bleeding profusely, he managed to run to Petersen’s house, about 100m away, where he collapsed.

His uncle, Brendon Jordaan, put Agulhas in the back of his bakkie and sat with him while another family member drove them to hospital, where the young boy died five minutes later.

Jordaan said he had kept his nephew on his side in the bakkie, and kept tapping his face to try to keep him awake.

At the hospital, the nurses wanted Agulhas to lie on his back on the stretcher so that they could treat the wound.

“But he did not want to be turned onto his back as he was in too much pain,” Jordaan said.

Agulhas died shortly afterwards.

His young female friend said the assailant was known in the area for his violent outbursts, which would usually result in fist fights or arguments.

“We were all there – we all saw how he stabbed John Luke,” the girl said.

“By the time he got back to his ouma’s house, the blood was all over his shirt and dripping on the floor.

“We play there [in the veld] every day, but [the 18-year-old] is not normally there – it’s just us smaller children.

“Sometimes the older children come and play with us to teach us, but he is never with them – he only wants to play with us because he bullies us.

“So we tease him back.

“But then he gets mad and wants to fight. But now he went to go fetch knives. [After the stabbing], he was in the street shouting ‘ wie’s volgende’ [who’s next],” she said.

The suspect’s 40-year-old mother and grandmother claim the young man has suffered from epilepsy since the age of three, resulting in episodes of “blank rage”.

The youth was arrested soon after the incident.

He appeared in the Uitenhage Magistrate’s Court yesterday on a charge of murder.

His mother paid his R800 bail and the case was postponed to May 8 for further investigation.

Speaking outside court yesterday, the young man’s mother said she had repeatedly warned the neighbourhood children not to tease her son.

However, Petersen and several other Gerald Smith residents – among them some of the parents of the cricket-playing group of children – said the 18-year-old’s condition was no excuse.

“There are so many people who have epilepsy. None of them have ever killed someone,” she said.

“You take your medicine and carry on.

“I lost my grandchild because of [him]. He had his whole life ahead of him.

“And children tease each other – it is part of growing up.

“These children have been playing cricket in this vlak [field] for years, and now for it to end like this – I am heartbroken.”

Meanwhile, the suspect’s grandmother, sitting in the lounge of her home just metres from where the stabbing occurred, claimed her grandson had been fetched at home by the group to play cricket.

“Because of his epilepsy, he just gets so frustrated,” she said.

“He sees red and grabs the first thing he can find and uses it.

“I have asked the children to leave him alone and go and play somewhere else.

“But the children come to the house and tease him.

“That’s what happened [on Tuesday].

“The children chased him all the way to the house, teasing him the whole time until they were in the yard. And even when he went into the house, they stayed in the yard and continued to shout insults.”

The suspect’s 16-year-old sister, who had been in her room at the time, said she had not seen her brother leaving the house with the knives as he regularly walked in and out the house.

“I just heard screaming,” she said.

“I checked through the window and saw my brother with the knives in his hands – then I ran out and saw John Luke running down the road.

“[My brother] dropped the knives and ran into the nearby bush where the police arrested him while he was still trying to calm down.

“He kept on saying, ‘ Ek het dit nie bedoel nie’ [I didn’t mean to],” she said.

Police spokesman Sergeant Majola Nkohli confirmed the incident and the suspect’s brief court appearance.