Police can still not say whether the body found on a Muizenberg beach is that of eight-year-old Savannah Mersin.
|||Five days after the body of a young girl was found on a Muizenberg beach, police can still not say whether the body is that of eight-year-old Savannah Mersin.
Provincial police spokesman Warrant Officer November Filander said the forensic process would be conducted on Wednesday.
Although another family member has positively identified the body as Savannah, Filander said the girl’s biological mother still had to identify the child.
For three days last week, Savannah’s foster mother, Felicity Coetzee, and Lavender Hill residents searched for the little girl, who was last seen at her school, Hillwood Primary, on the Tuesday afternoon.
But a child’s body discovered in a shallow grave on Sunrise Beach, Muizenberg last Friday, is believed to be that of the missing girl.
Meanwhile, police are on the hunt for a man and woman wanted in connection with the kidnapping and murder of Savannah, after witnesses told police the two murder suspects had asked about a child aged between eight and 10 at Sunrise beach last Tuesday, the same day the girl disappeared.
Filander said witnesses told them the woman had said the child was her foster child. She is described as being in her 30s, of medium build and overweight.
The woman was wearing a light-coloured golf shirt, blue jeans, a white silk headband, slippers and a black backpack. The man was in his early 30s, tall and slender.
Kidnapping charges that were brought against the mother of the murdered girl have been dropped.
Filander confirmed that Savannah’s mother Jessica, 31, and her boyfriend, whose name is not known, were arrested in connection with the murder last Thursday, but said that due to insufficient evidence, police released the couple on Sunday.
He said a murder docket had been opened, but no arrests had yet been made.
janis.kinnear@inl.co.za - Cape Argus
