Grandmother tells of brutal attack on Chelsea
2 February 2010, 15:42
By Fatima Schroeader
High Court Writer
The grandmother of five-year-old Chelsea Jacobs broke down in the Cape High Court on Monday morning as she recalled how she helped paramedics to pump the little girl's chest to try to jumpstart her heart.
Chelsea was still alive when she was found on a field in her neighbourhood in Delft on July 29, 2008, but she died soon after arriving at the Red Cross Children's Hospital.
Her grandmother, Brenda Pase, was the first State witness to take the stand after the accused, Marchall Gesels, pleaded not guilty to charges of abduction, rape and murder.
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He did not give a plea explanation. As Pase walked towards the witness stand, she started to cry.High Court Writer
The grandmother of five-year-old Chelsea Jacobs broke down in the Cape High Court on Monday morning as she recalled how she helped paramedics to pump the little girl's chest to try to jumpstart her heart.
Chelsea was still alive when she was found on a field in her neighbourhood in Delft on July 29, 2008, but she died soon after arriving at the Red Cross Children's Hospital.
Her grandmother, Brenda Pase, was the first State witness to take the stand after the accused, Marchall Gesels, pleaded not guilty to charges of abduction, rape and murder.
She told the court that she had sent little Chelsea to the shop to buy sugar on the day that she disappeared.
Ten minutes later, Chelsea had still not returned.
A worried Pase had gone to the shop to look for her granddaughter, but had not been able to find her.
Pase said she had called the little girl's mother, Lizania Jacobs, her boyfriend and her neighbours to help her search for Chelsea.
Later during the search, they had heard someone screaming from the direction of a nearby field.
They had gone to look and had seen little Chelsea lying on the ground. She had been brutally assaulted but was still breathing.
The man who found her had raced to call the ambulance and police. When the ambulance arrived, Pase had jumped into the vehicle with them.
As they drove to Red Cross Hospital, paramedics asked her to help them pump the little girl's heart.
Pase sobbed as she recalled the day.
At the hospital, nurses and doctors had tried to save Chelsea.
"But Chelsea became weaker and weaker. They (hospital staff) pushed her into another room and asked us (Pase and Jacobs) to wait in the trauma room," she said.
Moments later, a nursing sister and doctor informed them that they had tried everything they could but could not save Chelsea.
Gesels, who was a neighbour and friend of the little girl's family, was arrested an hour after the girl died.
The trial continues.
- This article was originally published on page 3 of The Cape Argus on February 02, 2010
Pretoria
