On the morning of July 28, eight teenage models were delighted to go on a film shoot. They’d been out of work for a long time due to the coronavirus outbreak, and they’d been picked to appear in a music video.
The salary was low — they were almost working for nothing — but it wasn’t the money that drew them in; it was the chance. Perhaps this is the opportunity they’ve been waiting for, when their careers will finally take off.
However, there were no fortuitous breaks. Instead, it was to be the darkest day of their lives.
South Africa is at odds with its women. It has one of the world’s highest rates of sexual assault, and on that July day, eight more names were added to the lengthy list of survivors.
Four of the young ladies who courageously recounted their tragic stories were introduced to me. Their moms were beside them, fighting back tears as they listened to their daughters tell the awful incident. To protect their identities, CBS News altered their names at their request.
The film team of 22 was filming in an abandoned mine waste in Krugersdorp, near Johannesburg. As they were finishing filming the last scene, a band of armed men invaded the set and ordered everyone to lay down, according to sisters Bontle and Amanda. When one of the sisters got too distraught to talk, the sisters would often complete one other’s words.
Illegal miners are apprehended by police in Krugersdorp, South Africa.
Authorities undertake a raid to apprehend illegal mine employees on August 3, 2022, in Krugersdorp, South Africa, after a band of armed men raped eight women recording a movie at an underused mine waste in the region.
GETTY/FANI MAHUNTSI/GALLO IMAGES
“Some of us attempted to flee,” stated Bontle, 19. “But, you know, we couldn’t because they were firing.”
“And there were males all everywhere,” her older sister Amanda said. “They were growing, maybe 15 or more of them.”
The assailants surrounded the victims, forcing them to lay face down in a deep hole while wearing balaclavas. Male crew members were stripped nude and kept imprisoned in a different location.
First, everyone’s phones and cash were stolen. Then there were the rapes. According to the ladies, the assailants took turns torturing and brutalizing all eight of the women for more than three hours before fleeing.
“Some of the girls and I were weeping. They were also screaming while being raped “Bontle said.
“And the second one, they raped her in front of our eyes,” Amanda added.
If the ladies would not participate, the males threatened to shoot them.
“Telling me that he would murder me and all that nonsense if I don’t listen to him,” Amanda recalled. “Then I’m like, let me do whatever he says because I don’t have a choice. Then he led me there, like… to the pit.”
At that moment, she broke down weeping, unable to continue, her eyes wide with fear and unable to get the words out as she recalled how they attempted to bury her alive.
Bontle was dragged to another location and raped twice. She thought she was going to die when a third man approached her.
“I saw that he was planning to rape me. Then I said, ‘I’m bleeding, I can’t.’ I pretended to have a miscarriage.”
They took her back to the hole and then abandoned her.
While the ladies were being attacked, Zintle managed to climb up a tree and hide for approximately an hour. When she couldn’t hear anything more, she jumped down, only to be seized and raped by one of the males.
Then there was Anita, the group’s leader and the one who had recruited her buddies for the film shoot. She now suffers with crippling remorse, blaming herself for what occurred. She begged the guys to kidnap her rather than her pals.
“I was basically pleading with them not to touch any of the females,” she said. “If it has to be me, it has to be me.”
Nobody was spared, and she was gang raped many times.
It revived ancient wounds for Anita. She informed CBS News that she was raped as a youngster. Then there’s this.
“But now that it’s happening again, I’m wondering why I’m even in this planet. Is it my destiny to become a rape victim? And every time I tried to build anything wonderful, it would simply come back and start…” She couldn’t continue. Her heartbreaking tears filled the room.
When their assailants left, the bruised and shattered ladies rushed directly to the police station to report the crimes. They were then violated a second time when their names and addresses were published on social media. Anita was heartbroken.
“I was thinking, why didn’t I simply die? I mean, what’s the point? You’ve done it again. You’ve already murdered me and taken away my innocence and purity. And now you want to destroy me physically, to the point that I can’t even step outside to take a break without everyone in my neighborhood seeing me, seeing my irritation, knowing that I’m not OK.”
This nation typically remembers South African women’s brave battle against apartheid in August. But there hasn’t been much to celebrate lately. It’s become a month of grief. In the nation, a woman is raped approximately every 12 minutes – and those are only the ones reported to police.
Outside the Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court, South Africans demonstrate against illegal immigrants.
African National Congress members demonstrate outside Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court on August 3, 2022, in Krugersdorp, South Africa, after an armed gang raped eight women who were making a video.
However, this horrific gang rape has pushed a nation already battered by gender violence over the brink. It has provoked criticism and demonstrations against what many see to be incompetent, if not blundering, police.
According to reports, the suspects in the incident did not speak any South African languages. More than 120 males have been apprehended by police, all of whom are in the country illegally. No one has been accused of rape. Authorities said they will analyze their DNA to determine whether it matches evidence gathered from the victims.
Illegal miners are apprehended by police in Krugersdorp, South Africa.
Authorities perform a raid to apprehend illegal mining employees at an abandoned mine in Krugersdorp, South Africa, on August 3, 2022, after an armed gang raped and robbed eight women recording a video in the region.
Lisa Vetton, a researcher with the Gendered Violence and Urban Transformation project at the University of Johannesburg, feels the criminal justice system fails women.
“You can really see in the previous decade how the number of rapes that are put down for conviction, that result in prosecution, has decreased,” she told CBS News. “If you consider that — and it goes hand in hand with the police’s terrible treatment of you — there is no reason to report. Why put yourself through this when there’s no assurance you’ll ever see justice?”
Outside the Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court, South Africans demonstrate against illegal immigrants.
ActionSA activists demonstrate outside Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court on August 3, 2022 in Krugersdorp, South Africa, after a group of armed men viciously gang raped eight women who were making a video.
The young ladies interviewed by CBS News have lived in dread since the tragedy. Anita claims she wakes up every night with the sensation that “someone was grasping my arm, and I smelled the fragrance of one of the males who was raping me.”
They claim they jump every time they hear gunshots and are concerned that now that their identities have been out, their assailants may want retribution.
“We really don’t know what to do anymore because we’re terrified of our lives — not only our lives, but the lives of our families, because we’re all not safe today,” Bontle added.
For them, like for many of women in South Africa, the emotional scars stay long after the physical harm has healed.