Suspected Ax-Wielding Serial Killer Shot, Wounded In South Africa

In a dramatic ending to a week-long chase, two policemen shot and wounded an ax-wielding former convict accused of killing a child and as many as 37 women.

President Nelson Mandela and his African National Congress congratulated police Thursday for the arrest, which followed mounting calls to catch the man identified a week earlier as the suspected serial killer.

The arrest of Moses Sithole, 31, late Wednesday ended the hunt for a suspect in the series of murders dating back more than a year in black townships near Pretoria and Johannesburg.

The women had been strangled or shot to death, and some were sexually assaulted. A child of one of the victims also was killed.

With elections for mayors and other local officials less than two weeks away, Mandela’s government hoped that catching Sithole will help bolster its tarnished crime-fighting image.

Sithole, an ex-convict who uses several aliases, was caught in an industrial area east of Johannesburg, police Commissioner George Fivaz told a news conference.