By Uapi Ngava
Windhoek

SENIOR Magistrate Sarel Jacobs on Friday ordered a postponement in the case of a suspected murder of an alleged prostitute on the premises of a Windhoek secondary school, which occurred over one year ago.
Appearing before Magistrate Jacobs was former Centaurus High School janitor Johannes Hendrik Venter, a 43-year-old white Namibian.
He was arrested soon after the discovery of the badly decomposed corpse in a disused former South African Defence Force armoury on the grounds of Centaurus last week. Venter admitted to a team of crack detectives that he did murder the woman, by way of strangulation, head of the investigating team Chief Inspector Nelius Becker told New Era.
Venter is divorced, and unemployed since he left his job at the school over a year ago, and lives with his sister. He was wearing a pair of jeans and a green T-shirt during his brief appearance. He is of medium build, balding at the top of the head and appeared unmoved in the dock.
An initial post-mortem examination by state-employed Cuban pathologist, Dr Amanda Rosa Gongora Hernandes, identified the deceased as of "Negroid" origin, female and 1,67cm in length.
Further information on the deceased is that she was a young Coloured woman who frequented the Ausspannplatz area of Windhoek which is usually teeming with young ladies who ply their trade. Evidence tends to indicate that Venter, after a heavy drinking bout, had maximum and unrestrained sex, causing the condom to burst. After the act, he allegedly strangled her to death and kept the corpse in his single-room flat situated on the school premises, for four days before carrying it to the old storeroom where it was discovered.
Death came to the alleged sex worker - a preferred title of decency for a prostitute - on the night of Good Friday on April 29 last year, while faithfully carry out the demands of her calling.
She was found dressed in a skirt, a spotted light T-shirt and without panties. And, perhaps a plus for the care exercised by some sex workers against the spread of the deadly HIV-Aids pandemic in Namibia, she had contraceptives with her.
Talking in smothered tones about her death and sounding apprehensive about what could befall them too, some women sitting in a corner of a local pub in the red light district area, were heard to remark that the deceased had made "'n kak deit" (a sh...t date).
The case was postponed to next month, July 28, irrespective of the accused's voluntary admission and, according to Chief Inspector Becker's team it has "positive evidence" to connect him (Venter) to the crime.
Accused persons may and often have in the past later denied having made admissions without duress placed on them by the arresting authorities, or in still other instances, decide to enter a plea of "not guilty". Also, the first instance of hearing was in a magistrate's court and not in a superior one, Deputy Prosecutor General Danie Small, explained to this reporter.