SHARPEVILLE. – A Sharpeville teacher’s decomposed and lifeless body was found dumped at Dlomo Dam in the early hours of Saturday, May 04.
Stella Skosana (34) a beloved Thuto-Lore Comprehensive School English Teacher went missing earlier last week only to be found murdered.
Her aunt, Nthabiseng Lekala (59), shared the heartbreaking details of Stella’s disappearance and subsequent gruesome discovery with Sedibeng Ster, untying a disturbing tale of betrayal and loss.
According to the aunt, Stella had been residing with her boyfriend for the past two years who claimed the teacher’s disappearance was driven by a minor domestic dispute they had.
While the mother of three hasn’t been to work [school] since Monday, the boyfriend only went to enquire about her on Thursday.
He later went to a local police station on Friday to open a missing person’s file in an attempt to find the missing teacher.
While police activated a manhunt for the missing teacher, news of a floating decomposed body at Dlomo was reported to the authorities after a fisherman made the gruesome discovery.
The family was called to the scene to identify the body, and positively linked identified the deceased with the missing teacher.
Speaking to Sedibeng Ster at their family home, Lekala said there are many discrepancies in the statements provided by the lover.
“Stella was not a person who would usually go awol. When the boyfriend came asking me about her disappearances, I told him I knew nothing, despite him claiming that she came to me following their fallout,” she said.
“I took the news light since her partner claimed he last saw her on Wednesday evening. When her colleagues came to my school on Friday, I began to worry now that I learned she absconded from work on Monday,” added the aunt.
Lekala said she then visited Powerville where Stella lived and she found the house empty with an outside light on.
“I questioned some of her closest neighbours, who told me that Stella had sent texts to borrow a wheelie bin. The texts seemed to suggest she wanted to dump ‘something’ and couldn’t use hers because it had no wheels. The neighbours told me the messages raised an alarm because of how she addressed them. I knew something bad had happened to her,” she said.
Following the visit to Stella’s house, police phoned the family demanding they identify a body at the dam.
“We found a badly decomposed body which we solely believe is Stella’s because of the marks she had. This is all written the boyfriend. Her phone remains online and someone continues to send people texts pretending to be the dead Stella.,” she said.
“We are left devastated and want answers on why someone who Stella loved dearly would separate her from her kids so gruesome,” said the visibly devastated aunt.
Sedibeng cluster police spokesperson, Captain Teboho Lephoto said an inquest docket is being investigated.
“A missing person file was open and police went for a search until the following day. A call was made to the police by a local fisherman near a local dam and he saw what looked like a body floating in the water. Police rushed to the scene with their expert units and the badly decomposed body was retrieved from the dam,” he said.
Lephoto said the family of the missing person was called in for identification.
“We would like to appeal to the lover who came and reported her missing person to make contact with the police again since the police efforts to find him have failed to this point,” said Lephoto.