Must-watch trailer: The ABC Killer, about serial killer Moses Sithole

Showmax has just dropped the trailer for The ABC Killer, a twisty true-crime documentary series about serial killer Moses Sithole.

Thirty years ago, rookie journalist Tamsen de Beer was working the night shift at The Star newspaper when she received a life-changing call from someone claiming to be South Africa’s most prolific serial killer.

Through repeat conversations, the two developed a disturbing rapport. “It was like a journey I was on with him,” says de Beer in the trailer. “We were bonded in a strange, ugly way. I was hoping he was okay all the time, which is absolutely crazy.” 

Just months after Nelson Mandela had become South Africa’s first democratically elected president, her caller hunted young, Black women across Atteridgeville, Boksburg and Cleveland in Gauteng – the ABC in his nickname.

He would go on to be convicted of 38 murders, 40 rapes and six robberies – all committed in the space of just over a year, in broad daylight, while sober. 

Watch the chilling trailer for The ABC Killer

“This was the biggest case of our history at the time,” says former detective Derrick Nosworthy in the trailer. “I don’t think we had ever had a case where there were so many people murdered by potentially one offender.”

“He was our Ted Bundy,” says director Jasyn Howes, who was a young boy in Johannesburg at the time.  

The ABC Killer is his second series in a row for Showmax about a 90s serial killer. The first, Boetie Boer, about Stewart Wilken, was nominated at last year’s SAFTAs for Best Documentary Series and Best Editor (Jaco Laubscher, who also cut The ABC Killer).

For the new three-part series, Howes tracked down many of those closest to the story, including de Beer and her night editor at The Star, Alameen Brendan Templeton, who admits in the trailer that he was worried his journalist “could end up as one of his victims.”    

South Africa’s first profiler Micki Pistorius and former detectives Ettiene “Vinyl” Viljoen, Frans van Niekerk, and Paul Nkomo weigh in on the biggest case of their careers.

Deputy national prosecutor George Baloyi revisits his case against Sithole, while attorneys Anthony Richards and Eben Jordaan discuss their defence of him.

Most movingly, survivor Buyiswa Swakhamisu relives the day of her attack, sharing how Sithole used the promise of work to convince her to follow him. She also details her own brave pursuit of justice.  

In addition, there are first-hand accounts of meeting Sithole from World Press Photo of the Year winner Jodi Bieber, clinical psychologist Dr Giada Del Fabbro, and former crime reporter Phalane Motale. In the trailer, Motale admits to being shocked when he saw the identikit. “I said, ‘That’s my friend.’”  

An anonymous fellow inmate describes recording a video interview with Sithole to try to sell his story. This video interview is included in The ABC Killer, along with video archive of Sithole being questioned by the SAPS in One Military Hospital in 1995.  

As in Boetie Boer, Howes uses extensive reenactments in The ABC Killer, mostly filmed in the story’s real world locations, including The Star, Germiston Train Station, Pretoria High Court and the factory where Sithole was eventually shot and arrested.  

Gifter Ngobenisen plays Sithole, with Louise van der Merwe as de Beer and Monte-Carlo Golden Nymph and SAFTA Best Actor nominee Graham Hopkins (The Lab, The Girl from St Agnes) as Judge George Curlewis.

As part of their research, Howes and SAFTA-winning writer Andy Petersen (Shaka iLembe, Red Ink) had access to transcripts of the telephone conversations between Sithole and de Beer at The Star, as well as her diary entry from the night of the first phone call, not to mention letters Sithole wrote to Dr Del Fabbro.

While serving 2 410 years in prison, Sithole is currently studying law after completing a degree in theology.  

The ABC Killer will be available to binge on Showmax from Tuesday, 22 July. Viewer discretion is advised.