A man has admitted to starting a fire that killed 76 people in an apartment building South Africa. The 29-year-old claimed he tied up and strangled a man in the basement of the dilapidated building.
He also explained that he sprayed gasoline on the man's body and set it on fire with a match. He also testified that he was using drugs and that one of his neighbors, a dealer, ordered him to kill the man.
The confession came during the investigation into the cause of the fire in Johannesburg. The accused was arrested and now faces 76 counts of murder and 120 counts of attempted murder.
The fire broke out last August in a multi-storey building early in the morning. Authorities believe that some of the victims jumped out of the window and fell to their deaths. Some tried to hang from the window with a sheet to get down, but they could not.
The ordeal has put Johannesburg's problem of “hijacked buildings” at the center of the map – dilapidated buildings seized by illegal occupants and abandoned by the authorities.
The City of Johannesburg owned the building, but it was occupied by illegal landlords who rented out the apartments to people who desperately needed a roof over their heads. Many of the building's occupants were immigrants suspected of being in South Africa illegally.
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