Jeannette Schoon and her daughter are killed by a letter bomb
Jeannette Schoon Curtis
Date: 28 June, 1984
Former member of South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU), Jeannette Schoon, and her six-year old daughter, Katryn, were killed by a letter bomb at Lubango, in northern Angola on 28 June 1984.
Anti-apartheid activist Marius Schoon (Jeannette's husband) was the target of the bombing because of his prior involvement in anti-apartheid politics. He was banned in South Africa and had initially taken his family into exile in Botswana, but they moved to Angola because they thought it would be safer.
The letter was delivered by Craig Williamson, a spy for the security police who pretended to be a family friend. The explosion occurred in Schoon's kitchen. Jeannette's three-year-old son, Fritz, was also in the kitchen at the time but he was not hurt.
The perpetrators Craig Williamson and Jerry Raven, who manufactured the bomb, appeared before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to apply for amnesty. The TRC granted amnesty to the applicants.
Read Amnesty application by Craig Williamson and Jerry Raven and TRC decision.
Sources:
- Coleman, M. (ed)(1998). A Crime Against Humanity: analysing the repression of the apartheid state, Johannesburg: Human Rights Committee, p. 133.
- Marius Schoon dies of cancer, aged 61 website: anc.org.za
- Image source