Kruger’s killers had previous convictions

After being kept in custody for eight years, five men who kidnapped and murdered a 60year-old man in 2010 will be sentenced in the Port Elizabeth High Court next week.

In May, judge Irma Schoeman found Khangelani Matebe, 31, Fundile Ngwensu, 25, Luyanda Nkolose, 26, Fuzile Kosana, 29, and Athenkosi Mtshayisa, 26, guilty of murdering St Albans resident Floris Kruger in September 2010.

It emerged during pre-sentencing proceedings on Wednesday that four of the five men already had convictions against them.

Matebe and Ngwensu, both 17 at the time of the Kruger murder, were also convicted of housebreaking with intent to rob and robbery with aggravating circumstances for a similar attack in July 2010 in the same street in which Kruger lived.

Kruger was attacked in his La Marseilles Road home and tortured between August 31 and September 1 2010.

He was eventually shot twice in the head and his body dumped near the Fairview racecourse.

Mtshayisa – who was out on bail when Kruger was murdered – has two previous convictions, for housebreaking and stock theft.

Kosana was convicted in 2014 of a 2009 robbery and is serving a 12-year sentence.

The five men will be sentenced on Friday next week.