White S. African Sentenced to Hang
A white ex-policeman who said he believes blacks are animals was sentenced to hang Thursday for killing seven blacks and an Indian man in two shooting sprees he hoped would provoke a race war.
The killings by Barend Strydom were committed “in an unfeeling and cold-blooded manner that I have never before experienced or heard of,” said Justice Louis Harms.
Harms convicted Strydom, 23, last week of killing seven people and wounding 15 blacks in a rampage on the sidewalks of downtown Pretoria on Nov. 15. A week earlier, Strydom said he killed a black woman and wounded another at a squatter camp, using them as target practice to determine whether he was ready for a larger-scale massacre.
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