Zoltán Toth

Zoltán Toth (1937 - 2011)

Brief overview:

Zoltán (73), a Hungarian, was hacked to death with a pick-axe, and bled out on his smallholding in Zuurbekom close to Westonaira. The story is told by his son - un-named - as he was only 9 years old at the time. "They said they were going to hang him. They lied,” he said after the ordeal. “We heard how the dog barked at someone outside in the yard at 19:00,” the boy recounted. “One pointed the firearm at me but I locked the door and hid,” he said.

Toth, a single parent, as his wife Angelina had passed in 2005, went to see what it was and the boy stayed behind and looked through the kitchen window. There were two men - one with a firearm and another with a knife. The boy said one of the attackers broke a window with a stone and unlocked the door from inside. Toth was still gone and had the only cellphone with him. “I hid behind the door and they looked for me for some time. The men said they would hang my father if I didn’t come out.”

One of the men found him behind the door and wanted to know where Toth had hidden the money. “I told them to look in the cupboards but they didn’t find anything.” After a long search, the men found a hidden safe which they broke open. They warned the boy that they would shoot him if he left the house, and that they would return later.
“I was very scared and alone. I didn’t know what to do. I waited for him my father to come back, and at 23:00 decided to watch TV. “I fell asleep just after 04:00 but woke up a little while later, at about 05:00.”

When it started to become light, he went outside to call for help, but found his father's blood-stained body about 10 metres from the kitchen door. He found an employee who called the neighbours. Ilona Katalin Papp, who moved from Hungary to South Africa a few years after Toth in the late 1960s, said he had sold about 10 of his pigs two weeks ago and that was why his murderers had known he had money.

Police spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Lungelo Dlamini said Toth presumably bled to death after he was attacked with a pick axe. "The suspects stole a considerable amount of money and fled.”

Brief Biography:

• Other Victims/Family
• Funeral/Memorial
• The Farm/Smallholding
• The Region (Land disputes, other incidents etc.)

Attack Details:

• Date and time of attack
• Weapons
• Items Stolen
• Investigative officer/SAPS Case No:
• Torture, Gratuitous violence
• Indications of Hate Crime? Threats etc.

Perpetrator details:

• Number and Descriptions
• Arrests
• Name/s and age/s of Perpetrator/s
• Country of origin of Perpetrator/s
• Trial/Conviction

Additional Biographical Information:

Links to Media articles:

• http://archive.fo/f3L2r
• http://archive.fo/T1o0f
• http://archive.fo/V6I1D
• https://archive.ph/ikwfy