British botanists fed to crocodiles by ISIS-linked gang | World | News

An ISIS-linked gang who stabbed and bludgeoned a British couple to death in South Africa and then fed their bodies to crocodiles has been found guilty of murdering the couple.

World-famous botanists Rod Saunders, 74, and his wife Rachel, 63, were ambushed while searching for rare gladioli flowers in a remote mountain range. The couple, who had been married for more than 30 years and lived in Cape Town, met a horrific end while camping next to a forest dam in the national park.

A South African court heard how the pair were brutally tortured for Rachel’s gold credit card PIN number and bank account details before being beaten to death.

Their bodies were then wrapped in sleeping bags and thrown into the mouth of Nile crocodiles from the Tugela River Bridge in Ngoye Forest National Park.

Just 48 hours before the attack, BBC presenter Nick Bailey had interviewed botanical experts for his special Gardeners’ World in the Drakensberg Mountains.

Shortly after the BBC2 wildlife documentary crew and botanical experts went their separate ways, the couple were attacked after pulling their 4×4 over to prepare for camping.

Durban High Court heard gang ringleader and Muslim convert Sayefundeen Del Vecchio, 44, acted alone and introduced them to his wife and tenant over the phone as a “good catch”.

He then ambushed the couple, forcing them to hand over their bank details before brutally murdering them, then texted his wife Bibi Patel, 34, and tenant Mussa Jackson, 40, to announce that “the hunt is in hell”.

Italian-born Del Vecchio instructed his wife Patel, the daughter of a Muslim cleric, and Malawian tenant Jackson to meet him in Saunders’ stolen Toyota Land Cruiser. At this point the court heard Rod and Rachel Saunders were already dead in the back of the vehicle.

Postmortem examinations revealed that Rachel had been brutally struck multiple times in the back of the skull with a heavy machete-like knife and stabbed repeatedly in the upper back. She had also received severe blows from a heavy, blunt instrument, believed to be the same weapon used to shatter her husband Rod’s skull.

Both victims were then stuffed into sleeping bags and thrown senseless into the back of their Toyota Land Cruiser 4×4. They were taken to meet his wife and tenant in the jungle before heading to the Tugela River Bridge, where the victims were thrown, still in their blood-soaked sleeping bags, into the crocodile-infested waters below.

Their mutilated bodies were eventually found washed up on the shore; They were in such a terrible state that they were completely unrecognizable. It took the combined efforts of two pathologists, DNA analysis and a dental specialist to finally confirm their identities.

Eight years after the murder, the ISIS-linked trio was found guilty. The court was told how the trio were caught after going on a R734,000 (£37,000) spending spree over a two-day period using Dr Saunders’ gold credit card.

They also purchased Bitcoin and transferred their savings directly to their bank accounts.

As the group makes increasingly extravagant purchases, a suspicious store assistant eventually discovers that one of them is Dr. He challenged him to prove that he was Saunders. After the gang immediately escaped from the store, the staff informed the police.

Officers had already begun searching for the beloved couple, unaware of their grim fate, after concerned colleagues reported that the couple had not been making their regular check-ins.

Tracing credit card transactions eventually led investigators to the gang, which was already on the terrorist alert list. Phones belonging to Saunders were later found on their property.

South Africa’s elite police unit, the Hawks, also seized jewellery, personal effects, camping equipment, laptops and a stolen Toyota. Hawks also discovered ISIS leaflets and literature inside the property, as well as an ISIS flag displayed in the garden.

Given ISIS links, the Foreign Office has warned of a terrorist threat to British tourists in South Africa after it was revealed Del Vecchio and his wife were on a terrorist watch list.

However, in the end, no terrorism-related charges were brought against the trio who supported ISIS.

After a collapsed trial and 160 grueling court days in which 60 witnesses gave evidence, Judge Esther Steyn convicted all three defendants of double murder, kidnapping, robbery and burglary.

Judge Steyn said DNA evidence, as well as mobile phone data and usage, “undoubtedly” linked all three to murders committed “with common purpose and equal guilt”.

All three refused to leave their police cells to hear the verdicts given in court.

Speaking to the court via video link, a spokesman for the Saunders family in England said: “Even after all these years, the incident itself and its aftermath are causing distress to the family. It was a terrible incident and we do not want to dwell on it as it was discussed in detail at the hearing.”

The sentencing was postponed until June 19. The trio face mandatory life sentences under South African law, ranging from a minimum of 15 years to life imprisonment.