Thief and snake smuggler ,Joubert was to appear to appear in court on the charges of housebreaking on 5 April.
Marius Joubert, 28, di3d in ag0ny after his illegally-smuggled Indochinese Spitting Cobra and a second snake pumped lethal venom into his hand and wrist after he stuck his hand in their tanks.
The married guard who was seen by his bosses as an ‘exemplary employee’ had been held for several days after being arrested for burglary and theft in his hometown.
Police in Hennenman, 100 miles north of Bloemfontein, had kept him in for questioning and were about to take him back to his house to search it for any proceeds of crime.
He realised that they would find his huge menagerie at the home where he lived with his wife Chimonet, 26, and that serious charges under the Wildlife Act would follow.
Officers took him in a marked car to the terraced corner house unaware that a spare room, a bedroom, the lounge and entrance hall were packed with over 60 snakes.
They were shocked to also find a crocodile, iguanas, monitors, tarantulas, hedgehogs and ferrets all kept warm by solar power, special heating pads and extractor fans.
It did not seem unusual to the officers when they took his cuffs so he could reveal stolen property when he asked if he could feed the creatures who he said would be starving.
A source close to the investigation said: ‘Joubert knew that sooner or later after his arrest the police would visit his home and that they would find all these illegally kept creatures.
The armed security officer realised that police were about to uncover his illegal racket of importing illegal animals that could see him serve 25 years behind bars.
So rather than face a long spell in a hell-hole jail he handed himself a d3ath sentence, even while police were present in his home.
Reinet Meyer, a senior inspector at the SPCA in Bloemfontein, told source that they found over 70 uncared for wild animals in Joubert’s home.
“For me, it was worse than a horror movie,” Meyer said.
Source Hararelive
