“I still feel like this is a dream I will wake up from and he will come walking through the door, with a smile on his face.”
These are the heartbreaking words of Sarah Klaase, whose grandson, soccer star Diego Cupido, 15, was amongst six teenagers who were shot in Rocklands, Mitchells Plain on Friday evening.
This is the second horror shooting on innocent teens in the Plain in just one week.
Diego joined his friends at a parkie just after 7pm when the gunshots rang out in Bosduif Road.
A friend of the teens says they all knew each other from school.
He explains: “On Friday, the shop was full, so a few of them stood in the park waiting to go to the shop.
“I was busy making a fire when I heard about 16 shots… I first thought it was klappertjies.
“I heard screaming, it was chaos outside. All the children who were at the shop were running.”
Diego, as well as Luke Middleway and Clayton Sterris were killed.
“I knew the two of them smoked and went to stand in the park away from the adults.
“I looked up and saw them fall, I shouted their names but there was no answer.”
The friend says she saw Luke crawling towards her gate.
“He crawled towards my house, it looked like his legs were shot, broken, there was so much blood, he just looked at us, we then rushed him to hospital.”
According to a source, the shooter parked his car on the road next to the park and walked towards the teens and opened fire on them.
The shooter then ran back to the car and sped off.
According to another resident, there were two shooters, one on either side of the park who boxed the laaities in.
The resident says: “One parked his car on the main road, and the other stood waiting at the park.
Diego’s aunt, Pedro “Nana” Klaase, says grandma Sarah, who raised Diego, came running down the stairs.
He adds: “I got there and he was just laying, bleeding. I didn't want to see him like that, I told him I am coming now, I am just going to fetch my phone, his last words was yes Nana.”
Sarah says she had a voorgevoel.
The hartseer ouma shares: “The whole day felt like a dream. I woke up with Diego on my mind.
“I anointed him all week. I thought it was God preparing him for a soccer journey, I would never think it was this.”
She says Diego had dreams of becoming a professional soccer player: “He was dedicated. He was going to go far, I know it, now he's gone. It doesn't feel real.”
Police spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Malcolm Pojie says Mitchells Plain SAPS opened three murder as well as three attempted murder cases for further investigation, with no arrests yet.
Rocklands Neighbourhood Watch member Valerie Moses says a call was made that all shops close for business at 9pm.
Moses reports: “We see a lot of incidents happen in front of shops or when our children are walking to the shop, so this is one of the proactive steps.”
This shooting comes in less than 72 hours after another mass shooting in Tafelsig on Wednesday, where Whitney Dennis, 15, and her friend Junaid Hill, 24, were shot and killed and two others injured.