Vuyo Mkhize
JOHANNESBURG: Police tape barricades the house, withered leaves lay in pockets on the driveway and dead plants hang on the veranda of a house in Edenvale where the skeleton of a 77-year-old woman was found on Thursday.
The woman’s remains lay inside one of the bedrooms of the house for two years without anyone noticing.
According to a legal search on the property, it was owned by Iola Ditcham. However, the police said they could not confirm or deny the woman’s identity until DNA tests were conducted on the remains.
Police were called in to investigate the seemingly abandoned house on Erasmus Road in Edenglen, Edenvale, after neighbours became suspicious as the yard grew unkempt and neither Ditcham or her brother, known only as Frank, had been seen on the property in years.
“Inside, the house was also unkempt. The remains were found inside a bedroom, in a corner – not on a bed. There was no smell from the corpse,” Detective Isaac Maluleke said.
Ditcham’s husband died over five years ago and the police suspect her brother – who had come to check on her from time to time – also died a few years ago.
Police also said Ditcham was a sickly woman and following her fall on the driveway a few years ago, she had rarely been seen outside.
Yesterday, neighbours were still reeling from the discovery.
“What breaks my heart is that she died alone… I could’ve come in to check on her,” said a neighbour.
The neighbour said she had noticed a putrid smell coming from Ditcham’s house over 18 months ago, but just thought it was a dead rat or cat.
Police also discovered a man in his sixties living in a shack at the back of the house. He was not aware that there was a decomposing body in the house.
Ditcham had no children, but had a niece in Cape Town and relatives in Australia, and they were still trying to get hold of the family to obtain statements. An inquest docket has been opened.
vuyo.mkhize@inl.co.za
