An “investigation” by a politician has revealed that missing Joshlin Smith’s mother allegedly smoked drugs on the day of her disappearance and only started looking for the child hours after arriving home from work.
Meanwhile, a source said police have picked up more people for questioning in the case of the missing 6-year-old girl from Saldanha Bay, who has been missing for nearly two weeks now.
Yesterday, the girl’s mother Kelly, 33, and boyfriend Jacquin Appollis went for the polygraph test, a.k.a a lie-detector test.
The test was facilitated by Patriotic Alliance president Gayton Mckenzie, who has put a R100 000 reward for information about the missing girl.
“The mom and boyfriend passed the lie detector test,” Mckenzie announced during a live broadcast on Facebook.
The politician said he spent the entire day yesterday trying to find all those who saw the girl in the hours before she disappeared from her home in Middelpos, Diazville.
Joshlin went missing last Monday (19 Feb) after her mother, who is a domestic worker, had gone to work, and left her in the care of Appollis.
Kelly told Mckenzie that she came home that afternoon and found her boyfriend with his friend Steveno van Rhyn.
Kelly says: “I told him [Jacquin] to get the gas can and then I noticed Joshlin wasn’t at home. When I asked, he said she was around the area, playing.”
This is a deviation from what she initially told the police.
She told cops that when she arrived at home that afternoon around 5pm, neither Joshlin nor Appollis were at home. And when he eventually came home, she asked where her daughter was, and he answered that he didn’t know.
She said she started searching for Joshlin around 7pm, and went to the police station at 9.40pm.
However, police confirmed a missing person’s case was only reported the next day.
Mckenzie said he has so far “uncovered” that there were three people who interacted with Joshlin in the hour before her disappearance, apart from her mom and Appollis.
A woman had apparently sent the six-year-old to check on her children at her home. But no one knows what happened to Joshlin after that.
Mckenzie also spoke to Steveno van Rhyn, who admitted that he and Appollis was part of the group who saw Joshlin and that they were smoking drugs during the afternoon.
Van Rhyn said: “We smoked a quarter button, the woman got up and asked Joshlin to check if her other child was still sleeping in another hokkie, she left and then both of them were never seen after that.”
He claimed: “Kelly came home past 5pm and she didn’t look for Joshlin yet, and smoked tik. Past 7pm she started looking for Joshlin.”
On Tuesday, Kelly admitted in another Facebook live with Mckenzie that she was a tik user and has been “clean” since the day her daughter disappeared.
When the Daily Voice asked police spokesperson Lieutenant-Colonel Malcolm Pojie to confirm the latest claims, he said: “Be advised that we are not at liberty to divulge our investigation methodology to the media or for public consumption as it can hamper ongoing investigation and furthermore in this case, poses a potential safety risk to those involved.
“At this stage, we can confirm that the mother and her boyfriend are not the centre of our investigation.
“No specific suspects have been identified as persons of interest. Investigation continues.”
Police have since scaled down the search for Joshlin.