American Tourist, Girlfriend Shot to Death in South Africa

On their last day alive, a South African woman and her American boyfriend visited a scenic wine area, then took in a movie in a trendy waterfront district.

Hours later, Edward Keim III of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Marilese Van der Merwe were dead--among the latest victims in South Africa’s crime wave.

Police were investigating the killing of the couple, found shot to death several miles apart near a crime-ridden township Monday. Their burned-out BMW was nearby.

They may have been carjacked after they left Cape Town’s Victoria and Albert Waterfront, where they had seen a movie with a friend and gone to a coffee shop before driving off about 12:30 a.m. Monday.

The double slaying comes after a German tourist was stabbed to death in front of his two children in Durban on New Year’s Eve--a killing that already has rattled South Africa’s tourist industry.

Van der Merwe, 28, had recently won a contract from American Express to market South Africa as a holiday destination to Australians.

Keim, 33, was shot once in the back of the head. His body was found on the beach in the early hours Monday. His mouth and nostrils were filled with sand, apparently because his killers had shoved his face into the beach to stifle any screams.

Van der Merwe’s body, with bullet wounds in the head and chin, was found five miles away on a garbage dump.

Police said they suspected that the motive for the crime was robbery.

A friend of Van der Merwe, Koos Louw, was quoted in a newspaper as saying Keim had flown to Cape Town on New Year’s Eve to spend the holidays with Van der Merwe.