‘He Cried… Then I Threw Him Into the River’: Woman Confesses to Killing Five-Year-Old Boy in Revenge Plot Over Gambling Debts

A heartbreaking murder trial in South Africa has exposed the chilling confession of a 40-year-old woman who admitted kidnapping and killing a five-year-old boy to punish his mother over a gambling addiction she claimed had ruined her life.

Global Mirror News gathered that the accused, Sibongile Happiness Ngwadla, pleaded guilty before the Durban High Court to charges of murder, kidnapping and attempted extortion, admitting that she deliberately targeted innocent Simphiwe Ntobeko Xaba because she blamed his mother for introducing her to online gambling.

According to her guilty plea, Ngwadla abducted the little boy on August 22, 2025, and took him to the Ezimeleni informal settlement, where a relative unknowingly sheltered the child.

She then used a burner phone to send ransom messages to the boy’s mother, Ntombifikile Xaba, demanding an eWallet payment of R60,000 for his release. She confessed that the money was intended to clear mounting debts she had accumulated through online gambling.

In one of the most disturbing moments of her confession, Ngwadla admitted that her resentment towards the child’s mother had grown after she believed she was abandoned during her financial crisis.

“I resented the deceased’s mother, who introduced me to gambling, for failing to assist me when I fell on hard times, and I sought to make her pay for it,” she told the court.

When Police Officers, community volunteers and residents launched an intensive search for the missing child and his photograph flooded social media, Ngwadla said she feared her plan had collapsed.

Rather than release the innocent boy, she chose a far more horrifying path.

She first took Ntobeko to a secluded area in Isipingo and attempted to strangle him.

“He cried so much that I stopped,” she confessed.

But the child’s tears did not save him.

Ngwadla later drove him to the Q Section of Umlazi, where she threw the helpless five-year-old into a river, ensuring he drowned.

She admitted before the court that the killing was carefully planned to eliminate the only witness who could expose her kidnapping and extortion scheme.

“I planned and executed the killing of the child to conceal the kidnapping and extortion, and therefore my actions were premeditated,” she said.

After the murder, Ngwadla attempted to cover her tracks by sending a WhatsApp message to her relative, falsely claiming she had safely returned the child to his mother before spreading another lie that the mother herself had thrown the boy into the river.

Investigators quickly uncovered the deception, leading to her arrest on August 27, 2025.

As her Legal Aid lawyer, Zeera Fareed, read her guilty plea in court, Ngwadla broke down in tears.

Following her conviction, she apologised to the grieving family.

“I apologise to the family that I have caused harm to. I am remorseful,” she said, adding that she hoped her sentence would convince them of the sincerity of her regret.

She also expressed a desire to apologise to her own five children, saying she had worked as a self-employed hairdresser in Durban before her arrest.

However, the victim’s mother firmly rejected Ngwadla’s claim that she introduced her to gambling.

Ntombifikile Xaba explained that although they once lived near each other in Umlazi, Ngwadla merely borrowed her cellphone to gamble online. She insisted she never encouraged her to gamble and revealed that the two had already fallen out months before the tragedy after Ngwadla allegedly broke her kettle and refused to replace it.

In an emotional victim impact statement that left many in court moved, Xaba described how the brutal loss of her son had permanently changed her life.

“I trust no one. I have become overprotective of my two boys. I no longer allow them to leave my sight. I don’t allow them to go out and play with other children because I fear they will not return,” she said.

The court has adjourned the matter until Thursday, when sentencing proceedings are expected to begin, bringing the grieving family one step closer to justice for a little boy whose life was cruelly cut short by an act of revenge.