Durban - Members from the Reaction Unit South Africa (Rusa) are on the hunt for a suspect who allegedly raped a 20-year-old woman in a bush in the Buffelsdraai area, just north of Durban on Tuesday.
According to Rusa, a Durban Solid Waste (DSW) employee saw the suspect drag the 20-year-old woman into a bush.
The DSW employee told Rusa the man was armed with a panga.
When Rusa officers got to the scene, they saw a crowd of people attempting to look for the woman.
It is believed they could hear her scream for help while the man was dragging her through the dense vegetation where she had just been raped.
The 18 officers who were hunting down the suspect got lucky and found the victim in time.
“Her screams for assistance suddenly stopped. It was presumed that the suspect had murdered the female. Eighteen Reaction Officers began a co-ordinated search of the area when the suspect and the victim were spotted several hundred metres away.
“The man fled further into dense vegetation when he noticed Rusa Members approaching. The victim confirmed that she had been raped. The suspect thereafter asked her to follow him,” Rusa said.
She told officers she believed the man tried to kill her.
Just hours before the incident, Rusa officers found the body of a man who had suffered around 40 stab wounds lying in a bush.
The body was found 1km away from where the 20 year-old woman was raped.
The body of the unidentified man was found with stab wounds to the neck, chest and back as well as blunt force trauma to the face, Rusa said.
The body was found next to a river by a passer-by at around 8am on Tuesday morning.
IOL