Profiler: True Crime Africa

Weeks before the attack on a six-year-old girl at a school in Umhlali, Profiler Africa examined a teenage suspect linked to an alleged bomb plot at Ballito Junction shopping mall.

Now Paul Llewellyn and Dr Gérard Labuschagne return to the case with investigative journalist Jacqueline Herbst of the North Coast Courier, who broke the original story.

Jacqueline discusses her investigation, the reported manifesto, warnings circulated online, questions over the handling of the suspected explosive device, and the events surrounding the school stabbing.

Gérard examines the alleged second manifesto, behavioural warning signs, violent online subcultures, and why a criminal prosecution is no substitute for an evidence-based threat assessment.

The discussion also addresses the injured child's recovery, the trauma experienced by the school community, the difficulties of managing threatening behaviour involving minors, and the need for behavioural assessment and management programmes in South Africa.

Could earlier intervention have reduced the risk of this attack? And who is responsible for ensuring credible threats are properly assessed?

The accused is a minor. Allegations concerning the offence and institutional conduct remain subject to investigation and legal proceedings.

Earlier Profiler Africa discussions:

https://youtu.be/U4vuiGKOKIc

https://youtu.be/hSTtpA5DOWM

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South Africa has recorded 45 mass-killing attacks in 2026, involving at least 210 deaths and 79 wounded.

Paul Llewellyn and Dr Gérard Labuschagne are joined by investigative journalist and organised-crime specialist Julian Rademeyer, author of Killing for Profit.

They examine the criminal economies behind South Africa’s mass violence — including gangs, extortion, illegal mining, taxi conflict and illicit firearms — and ask whether mass killing is increasingly being used as a tool of terror, retaliation and territorial control.

Julian also discusses failing intelligence structures, criminal governance, South Africa’s similarities with Brazil, and three interventions he believes could begin changing the trajectory. Sequence 01 Copy 02

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Are the Kempton Park killings linked — and how would investigators actually establish that?

Lt Col (Ret) Elmarie Myburgh brings around four decades of policing experience, including nearly three decades in investigative psychology and criminal profiling, to a detailed conversation with Paul Llewellyn about how suspected serial cases are actually investigated.

They unpack linkage analysis, modus operandi, victimology, geographical “comfort zones”, forensic evidence, DNA and the crucial difference between cases that appear similar and cases that can actually be proved to be connected.

Elmarie also explains why she worries that a major investigation can become “too top-heavy”, what her ideal investigative team would look like, how traditional media can help or hinder police, and what happens when social media produces an army of amateur “couch detectives”.

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After more than 100,000 people watched Profiler Africa's first Kempton Park investigation, viewers sent us their questions.

Former SAPS criminal profiler Dr Gérard Labuschagne returns to examine what is known about the deaths of nine women and what remains unconfirmed.

How would police establish whether the cases are linked? Could there be multiple offenders? Could more victims remain undiscovered? How might an offender be approaching women? What can geography and behavioural linkage tell investigators? And does SAPS have the right people running the investigation?

Gérard also explains what police should keep secret, why the discovery of a body does not tell investigators when the murder occurred, and why earlier unsolved crimes may matter.

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Kempton Park Serial Killer? | Five Bodies. One Killer?

Five women's bodies have been discovered over roughly two months, with the first four recoveries concentrated around Kempton Park and Rhodesfield and a fifth case reported in Olifantsfontein.

Paul Llewellyn and former head of SAPS Investigative Psychology Dr Gérard Labuschagne examine whether some of the deaths could be connected — and what investigators need to establish before separate murders can be classified as serial murder.

Gérard explains geographic profiling, victimology, forensic and behavioural case linkage, offender signature, body recovery zones and how a specialist task team approaches a possible murder series.

Based only on information currently available publicly, he also gives his assessment of the likelihood that at least some of the bodies will ultimately be linked to the same suspect.

A single common offender has not been established. The investigation remains ongoing.

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In 2005, Jessica Wheeler and Victoria Stadler were murdered less than a month apart in Knysna.

The crime scenes appeared very different. But investigators began to suspect that the two young women had been murdered by the same offender.

Dr Gérard Labuschagne — then Commander of the SAPS Investigative Psychology Unit — was brought into the investigation to conduct a behavioural linkage analysis.

DJ Heinrich van Rooyen was eventually convicted of both murders and sentenced to two life terms. But he has always maintained his innocence.

In this episode of PROFILER, Gérard takes us inside the original investigation: how the murders were linked, how behavioural linkage works, the differences between MO and signature, why Van Rooyen became a suspect, the DNA and other forensic evidence, his changing versions of events, and what ultimately happened in court.

We also hear from investigator Mike Bolhuis, who was involved in the case at the time.

More than twenty years later, Van Rooyen remains in prison and arguments about his guilt continue.

The linkage analysis concluded that one offender murdered both women. But was Heinrich van Rooyen that offender?

Did they get the right man?

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What was it actually like to train as a criminal profiler at the FBI Academy at Quantico when profiling was still an emerging discipline?

In 1990, Amsterdam homicide detective Carlo Schippers was selected to spend an entire year at Quantico, training and working alongside some of the pioneers of modern criminal profiling.

John Douglas was running the unit. Carlo was taught by figures including Robert Ressler, Roy Hazelwood and Ken Lanning. His training included forensic pathology, abnormal psychology, studying solved murders and eventually working on real cases submitted to the FBI by police departments across the United States.

It was also a remarkable moment in profiling history. The Silence of the Lambs had been partly filmed at the FBI Academy and was released while Carlo was there. He remembers taking the same elevator seen in the film down to the underground Behavioral Science Unit, watching the media descend on John Douglas and attending a special preview of the movie with FBI Academy staff.

Carlo joins former head of the SAPS Investigative Psychology Section Dr Gérard Labuschagne and Paul Llewellyn to give a rare first-hand account of that year: how FBI profilers were trained, what the work actually involved, what Hollywood got wrong and how Carlo eventually took what he had learned back to the Netherlands and became the country's first profiler.

Carlo also discusses his new book, Denken als de dader — Thinking Like the Offender, looking back across his 45-year police career and the reality of working with homicide, serial murder, sexual offending, missing persons, stalking and coercive control.

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Brian Mudyiwayana did not rely on force to find his victims.

He relied on trust.

Lt Col Elmarie Myburgh joins Paul Llewellyn and Dr Gérard Labuschagne to take listeners inside one of South Africa's most disturbing serial murder investigations.

The discussion explores how promises of employment and relationships became methods of victim selection, how investigators linked murders across multiple towns through behavioural analysis, victimology and forensic evidence, and what Myburgh observed during her interview with Mudyiwayana after his conviction.

The conversation also examines offender psychology, post-offence deception, rehabilitation, parole and why power, control and excitement became central to the court's understanding of the offender.

Brian Mudyiwayana was convicted of six murders and sentenced to six life terms plus 17 years' imprisonment.

Most people assume someone caught with child sexual abuse material is simply looking at images. Investigators, psychologists and behavioural specialists see somethingvery different.

In this episode of Profiler Africa, Paul Llewellyn speaks to Dr Gérard Labuschagne and Kirsten Clark about the psychology of child sexual offenders, the growth of online exploitation networks, and the landmark Gerhard Alberts case that helpedchange how South African courts approached these crimes.

A discussion about offender behaviour, cognitive distortions, digital investigations, risk assessment, and the uncomfortable reality that some of the most dangerous offenders can appear completely ordinary.

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From the recent Pretoria Boys High controversy to the Primrose Primary shooting and the infamous Krugersdorp sword attack, South Africa has repeatedly been forced to confront the reality of violence in schools.

In this episode of Profiler Africa, Paul Llewellyn is joined by Dr Gérard Labuschagne and former SAPS Investigative Psychology specialist Kirsten Clark to examine the warning signs that often emerge before violence occurs, the psychology behind threats and targeted attacks, and why schools frequently miss opportunities to intervene before tragedy strikes.

The discussion explores threat assessment, leakage, grievance, behavioural warning signs, and the critical difference between punishment and prevention.

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