“Not a moffie” cannibal killer pleads guilty to murder

A man who said he ate another man’s heart to prove he isn’t gay has pleaded guilty to murder.

At the start of his trial on Monday, Zimbabwean Andrew Chimboza, 35, admitted to killing Mbuyiselo Manona, 62, in Gugulethu in June 2014, as part of a plea agreement in the Western Cape High Court.

The incident took place after Chimboza, a window-tinter, visited a female client at her home, where he also encountered Chimboza.

According to the statement he gave to police after the murder, Chimboza said: “The reason for me to eat the unknown guy’s heart was to show him that I am not a moffie [gay] and after I finished eating the heart, I realised he was dead.”

Chimboza has, however, since disputed the statement and his motivation for the attack, claiming that Manona had accused him of sleeping with the client, who was Manona’s girlfriend.

Chimboza also says that he did not eat his victim’s heart. He has admitted that when the woman was out of the house he stabbed Manona repeatedly and slit his throat in a rage, in what he claims was self defence after Manona attacked him.

Sapa reported that forensic pathologist Dr Lekram Alli confirmed in court on Tuesday that Manona’s heart had been removed from his chest cavity and cut into pieces.

“The heart was not present in the chest cavity… the heart was presented to me in a plastic bag separately in numerous pieces,” testified Alli. “Those pieces were not torn pieces. They were cleanly blocked, incised pieces.”

A witness claims to have seen Chimboza through the window using a knife and fork to cut and eat pieces of the heart.