It's beyond barbaric

As I got news of this last night on the Radio, I thought what has come of us, can people be so cruel - so heartless?

Is this the way we treat human's? Where is our sense of compassion, are these killers not afraid of the law...Oh what Law I ask for there is no law except one that protects these criminals...

I am saddened by these events and more so this could be my mother, sister, granmum or aunt...

'It's beyond barbaric'

A Pretoria woman was hacked to death and her domestic worker seriously injured in what has been described by police as one of the Pretoria's most brutal murders yet.

Rashida Ahmed, 49, was at her home in Laudium on Monday when two men forced their way inside.

Locking themselves inside the house, the men, who are believed to have been armed with a spade and a panga, overpowered Ahmed's domestic worker, Sara Malatji, before they attacked Ahmed, who was in her bedroom.

Police sources say the men, over the period of about an hour, repeatedly hit Ahmed over the head, shoulders neck and chest as they dragged her around the house demanding money. The house was ransacked by the killers, including the ceiling, of which the hatch was discovered open.

'It can't be true'

Neighbours' description of chilling screams for help from Ahmed as she tried to claw her way through a security gate, and blood smears and pools, bear testimony to the brutality of the killers.

Police refused to be drawn into whether the robbers tortured their victims before they fled in a grey car parked near the house, but several said it was one of the worst murders they had come across.

"It is beyond barbaric. It is inhuman. It is awful," said an officer.

The grey car had earlier been spotted by a neighbour's gardener as it travelled up and down Himalaya Street several times before it stopped near Ahmed's house.

Two men were seen getting out of the car moments before the attack took place and later running back to the car, which raced off to an unknown destination.

'I saw her against the gate trying to get out'

Hundreds of friends, family and neighbours rushed to the house as word of the attack quickly spread.

It was the second such tragedy to strike the Ahmed family in the past three years.

Three years ago, Ahmed's brother, Hussain Abdulrahman, was killed in his driveway in a hijacking just a street away.

Ahmed's husband, Ali, and children Riaaz, 22, and Shariefa, 25, were inconsolable when they received the tiding.

Riaaz had to be carried away forcefully from the house by friends as he tried to break open a locked security door which separated him from his mother.

Shariefa, collapsed on the family's front lawn as Malatji, who had to be resuscitated, was rushed by paramedics to an ambulance.

"It can't be true. It's not true. My mother is not dead. Please, God, don't let my mother be dead," she cried.

Her father, who was overcome by grief, was unable to say anything. Sitting on the patio shaking his head over and over again, he rocked himself as sobs wracked his body.

Neighbours Surie Chetty and Sajhida Omar said they were inside their homes when they heard screams for help.

"I heard Rashida calling me, pleading for me to help. It was horrible. She was screaming and pleading for help. As I ran outside I saw her against the gate trying to get out.

"The gate was locked. I couldn't get inside. I tried calling her, but it suddenly went quiet. I tried to see what happened, but I couldn't see," said Omar.

Chetty said she went cold when she heard the screams.

"They sounded like a wounded animal. When I ran outside I saw a woman with blood all over her.

"I did not know what was happening. Her maid screamed for me begging for help and then she collapsed."