Elderly victim from Pretoria shares his ordeal after brutal attack

The 79-year-old man, whom home invaders tortured by pouring boiling over his legs at his Menlyn Maine residence recently, shared the details of his horrific ordeal with Rekord this week.

Peter Treichel, a former director of an engineering company, said he was home alone last Thursday when two men entered his house and overpowered, attacked and tortured him for two hours.

Treichel was taken to the Life Wilgers Hospital where he received 32 stitches for multiple cut wounds to his head. He was also treated for high blood pressure due to the trauma of the attack.

Treichel said he was busy with one of his hobbies, editing photos and videos, at the time of the attack.

At around 22:00, he decided to call it a night and first changed into his pyjamas before heading back to the living room where he opened the sliding door slightly to get some fresh air as he was feeling hot.

“I put on some German soccer to watch. About five minutes later two unknown men appeared from behind the curtain and grabbed a flower vase and hit me over the head from behind.

“At this point, I was bleeding like hell.”

At first, Treichel put up a fight with the smaller-built attacker before the second attacker grabbed him around the neck and started strangling him with a red copper cable.

“I just held my neck stiff because it felt like he was trying to break my neck.”

Treichel screamed for help when the attackers started tying him up with cables, but they stuffed a cloth in his mouth.

This was the start of the two-hour long torture where the attackers repeatedly asked Treichel to open his safe and the whereabouts of his wife.

“By then, they’ve beaten me up five times. They kept asking me where the safe was.

“The one attacker stood on my neck for what felt like 30 seconds. They then hit me so much I had no choice but to tell them where the safe was. They said if I did not show them where the safe was, they were going to kill me.”

Treichel said the attackers pushed him blindfolded upstairs to the room where the safe was.

Upstairs, Treichel was again assaulted and interrogated about the whereabouts of his wife.

He, however, stuck to his previous story of her being out of town with her daughter.

Treichel’s wife was at the time sleeping in the shop on the same property, a few metres away from where he was attacked.

The attackers then kicked Treichel down the stairs for him to go and fetch the key to the safe.

In the midst of the attack, a blindfolded Treichel somehow got hold of the panic button with his tied hands which he slid into his pyjama pants without the attackers noticing.

After the attackers attempted to break the safe from the wall, they asked Treichel for a screwdriver to loosen it.

He gave them a wood shaver which was in the kitchen.

“At this point, I was willing to give up the safe instead of my life.”

The attack again continued; this time one of the suspects went downstairs to boil a kettle and returned to pour the boiling water over Treichel’s leg, while he was still blindfolded on the floor.

The attackers also threatened to cut off his finger for his ring as they had difficulty removing it. Treichel managed to remove it by spitting on his hand to get the gold wedding ring with a small diamond loose.

Finally, the attackers took the safe downstairs before pushing the blindfolded Treichel, down the stairs.

The attackers then tied Treichel up again and wedged him underneath the kitchen table with a chair before fleeing with the safe.

“They gave me a last kick and said they were coming back to kill me.”

The attackers fled with cash, electrical appliances, a cellphone, liquor and other items.

Treichel said he then wiggled his hands and managed to get the ties looser to get hold of the panic button inside his pyjama pants.

“When they tied me up again, they didn’t tie me up well enough and I could free myself.”

Between last year June and November, the couple’s property was broken into eight times.

Treichel was recovering well.

Provincial police spokesperson Captain Mavela Masondo said no arrests have been made yet.

“Brooklyn police is on a manhunt for the two suspects,” he said.

Anyone who has any information on the crime is kindly requested to contact Crime Stop on 08600-10111 or the Brooklyn police at 012-366-1735/6. Callers may remain anonymous and all information will be treated with the strictest confidentiality.