A Bloemfontein landlord convicted as an accomplice in the rape of her Zimbabwean tenant has lost her appeal against conviction, but the Free State High Court h...
A Bloemfontein landlord convicted as an accomplice in the rape of her Zimbabwean tenant has lost her appeal against conviction, but the Free State High Court has reduced her life sentence to 12 years.
Nyaleng Taaibosch was convicted alongside Shuping Sydney Gopane after the court found that she encouraged two men to sexually assault her tenant during an incident in October 2008. The appeal judgment was delivered on September 17, 2026.
The complainant, who was 29 at the time, had been renting two rooms at Taaibosch’s home in Bloemfontein for several months.
On the evening of October 2, 2008, the woman returned home with Taaibosch’s seven-year-old daughter after they had gone to have their hair braided.
According to evidence before the court, Taaibosch was at the house with her boyfriend and other people when the pair returned. The complainant said Taaibosch singled her out and made comments referring to her as a foreigner before telling the men that they could do what they wanted to her and should kill her afterwards.
Taaibosch then left the house with her daughter and locked the door from outside, leaving the complainant with two men.
The complainant was subsequently assaulted and managed to escape through a kitchen window before seeking help from a friend. Police later arrested Taaibosch and one of the men involved.
During the appeal, Taaibosch argued that her words did not amount to an instruction or encouragement to commit the offence.
The High Court rejected that argument, finding that her words and conduct, considered together with what happened immediately afterwards, demonstrated that she intended to facilitate the attack. The court upheld the finding that she was criminally liable as an accomplice even though she did not personally carry out the assault.
The court also found that the attack contained xenophobic elements because the complainant was targeted in part because she was Zimbabwean. The judges further considered the relationship of trust between the landlord and her tenant as an aggravating factor.
However, the appeal court reached a different conclusion on the sentence.
Taaibosch was 54 at the time of sentencing, was a widow with four children, worked as a domestic worker earning R850 a month and had no previous convictions.
The judges found that the fact that she was not physically present when the rape occurred and did not personally inflict the injuries constituted substantial and compelling circumstances warranting a departure from the prescribed life sentence.
The court therefore dismissed her appeal against conviction but upheld her appeal against sentence.
Her life sentence was replaced with 12 years’ imprisonment, backdated to June 24, 2016. (Conviction)
The ruling means that while the court did not overturn Taaibosch’s conviction as an accomplice, it found that her individual level of participation justified a substantially shorter sentence than the life imprisonment imposed previously.
