BELGIAN IMMIGRANT RAPED IN SECOND ATTACK ON FAMILY

Adele Stiehler

JANUARY 19, 2001 -- A Belgian immigrant family living in Centurion has experienced the hell of undergoing two armed attacks within the past four months -- during which the French-speaking wife was raped, their three-year-old daughter was tied up with their parents and they were robbed of all their valuables.

The man, a Flemish-speaking Belgian, said during the most recent attack this week, again by two armed men, the young immigrant couple had been forced at gunpoint to his study, where the couple were trussed up with their three-year-old daughter with electrical cord, some of which was also wound tightly around the child's neck.

Police inspector Gideon Thessner said the two attackers then dragged the wife and the little girl to the main bedroom to fetch jewellery, where one of the men raped the young wife while the other one packed all the family's belonging into their car.

The attackers, in their early twenties, were very aggressive, the immigrant said.