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Murderer confesses to killing priest in South Africa

Published: June 23, 2009

The killer of an Austrian priest working in South Africa has confessed to the crime in an anonymous note left at a church, South African police say.

They said the handwritten note found in the Mariazell mission church where victim Ernst Plochl, 78, had worked, also contained an apology for the murder at the end of May, the Austrian Times reports.

And it described how the killer had bound and then strangled the clergyman.

Bernhard Pagistch from Gallneukirchen, Lower Austria, a close friend of the late missionary who himself had worked at the Mariazell mission station for 40 years, said there was still no lead as to the identity of the murderer.

Originally from Austria, Fr Plochl had worked in South Africa for 41 years and recently told his friends in Austria he would not be returning to the country of his birth for health reasons.

He was the third Catholic priest to be murdered in South Africa this year.

SOURCE

Anonymous confession in Austrian priest murder case (Austrian Times)

 

 

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