Andrew Kathindi
Police have confirmed that the remains that were discovered in a shallow grave in Walvis Bay on Tuesday 6 October are those of Shannon Wasserfall.
“On Friday, October 9, 2020, a breakthrough was made on the basis of fingerprint comparison which resulted that a print (not completely decomposed) from the human remain is identical to the fingerprints on the application form of identity of a certain Shannon Ndatega Wasserfall,” Head of the Namibian Police Criminal Investigations, Commissioner Moritz !Naruseb said.
This comes after 28-year old Azaan Madisia was detained before being officially charged with murder and obstruction of a court of law in connection with Wasserfall’s disappearance.
“The Namibian Police Force has members of Scene of Crime Division attached to National Forensic Science Institute, trained in classification, rectification, searching, filling and identification of fingerprints.”
The Commissioner further said that their investigations on the murder and defeating the course of justice, was progressing very well, with Madisia remaining the sole suspect.
“The investigations are continuing. There is so much information out there that has flooded social media, but we are more concentrating on credible and diminishable evidence,” he told Windhoek Observer.
When contacted for comment, Wasserfall’s father, Tega Matheus said that he had not yet been informed by police on the confirmation of the identity of the remains.
Matheus, who viewed the remains on Thursday 8 October after they were transported to Windhoek for DNA testing, said he has been awaiting word from the police to confirm the identity of the remains.
“I have not seen anything. No one has been in contact with me yet on this. It might be that they informed the mother, but I’m hearing this from you. I can’t say what the next step is now, because I am still waiting for the police. I must hear it from the police.”
This comes after Matheus previously said that the police were keeping him in the dark over the progress of Wasserfall’s case.
Matheus previously claimed that the investigating officer on the case, Abuid Tjikamise, had said that he was overwhelmed and tried to remove himself from the case two months after Wasserfall’s disappearance.
Wasserfall went missing on 10 April this year and after six months of searching, an anonymous SMS was sent with the exact location of the remains.
The case is on the court roll and was postponed to 07 December for further investigations.
