Africa: One of the serial rapists was arrested by police because he used his Facebook to attract his victims to show them a fake Facebook business. He has been sentenced to two life terms behind bars.
Twenty-one-year old ‘Mehlodi Robert Baloyi’ was accused regretful of ravishing four victims, aged under 15 to 22, in Westenburg, Polokwane, between August 2019 and October 2020.
He was convicted in the Limpopo High Court in Polokwane on Wednesday.
Moreover, despite the two life terms for rape, he was also punished with ten years in prison for other counts of rape, ten years in jail for robbery, and two years for theft, police spokesperson Brigadier Motlafela Mojapelo said.
The sentences will run together.
The court heard that Baloyi used Facebook to promote his tattooing business.
Mojapelo said:
If someone wants to get a tattoo, they directly approach him through Facebook messenger texts, and he would, after that, offer them free tattoos, saying it will be his marketing strategy in the victims’ areas. When the victims agreed to come to his tattoo shop, he would take them to an abandoned RDP house [in] Westenburg Extension 71 and rape them.
Apart from this, he even robbed many victims of cell phones.
As per sources, Baloyi wasn’t the only rapist who used social media in order to lure women.
In 2021, the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg convicted Thokozani Jiyane to eight life sentences and 223 years for raping ten women in Boksburg between December 2019 and February 2020.
He also used Facebook in order to attract his victims after pretending that they belonged to the film industry, offering jobs to unsuspecting women in the industry or promoting a clothing label.
Many victims have also attracted women via Facebook by pretending to be pastors or offering work opportunities to domestic workers and security guards.
