Man guilty of murdering brother and parents with an axe

A man has been found guilty of murdering his parents and brother with an axe at their home in an upmarket housing estate in the winelands of South Africa.

Henri van Breda was also convicted of the attempted murder of his sister, Marli van Breda, who was left with severe injuries and retrograde amnesia which left her unable to remember the incident.

She was 16 at the time of the attack.

The jury at the Western Cape High Court came to a unanimous verdict, convicting the 23-year-old of three counts of murder.

He had denied all charges, but was found guilty of the January 2015 attack which claimed the lives of his parents Martin and Teresa van Breda, and brother, Rudi.

The wealthy family had emigrated to Australia, but returned to South Africa to set up a home one De Zalze Estate in Stellenbosch, near Cape Town.

Judge Siraj Desai said the guilty verdict was “inescapable”, before denying Van Breda bail. He will be held in custody until his sentencing.

He showed no emotion when the judgement was read out.

The trial, which garnered international attention, began two years ago after Van Breda handed himself in to police.

Giving evidence, he claimed that his family was attacked by an intruder wearing gloves, dark clothes and a balaclava in the early hours of the morning.

He said he heard banging sounds in the house and opened a door to see someone attacking his brother with an axe.

He said his father came into the room and accosted one attacker, who was wearing a ski mask, after he shouted for help. There had been at least two attackers, he said, adding that he suffered minor injuries while wrestling with one intruder and then said he lost consciousness.

More than two hours after the attack, he called the emergency services and told them, in a phone call played out in court: "My family and me were attacked by a guy with an axe."

Police later found him sitting outside the family house with the victims’s blood all over the house, and discovered a bloodstained axe and knife inside.

The judge said Van Breda, who was 20 at the time of the attack, had staged the crime scene and "intentionally" inflicted injuries on himself "in order to mislead the police as to the true identity of the perpetrator".

He added that "there was no security breach the night of the murders" and that nobody in the estate had "complained about strangers or any undue occurrence".

He was also found guilty of one count of obstruction of justice.

Associated Press contributed to this report.