A Zimbabwean man who raped and murdered a British woman in 2014 was only arrested after the victim’s niece spent years working to avenge her aunt’s death.
Lehanne Sergison, now 51, spent years writing to her aunt’s killer online and tried to set up a sting operation, after becoming frustrated with the lack of progress on the case.
Yesterday, Christine Robinson’s killer, Andrea Imbayarwo, 32, was found guilty of attacking his 59-year-old employer at her 125-acre Rra-Ditau lodge in Limpopo, South Africa.
He was employed at the game park as a gardener, and fled to Zimbabwe after staff found Ms Robinson wrapped in a duvet, and her throat slashed.
The year of her aunt’s death, Ms Sergison, from Kent, created a petition calling for action to find her killer. She also began searching for him online.
Four years later, in 2018, she found he was active on dating sites and living in South Africa again.
Ms Sergison created a false identity on Facebook under the name of Missy Falcao — a combination of her dogs’ names — and connected with some of his friends.
She then approached Imbayarwo directly, flirting and telling him he was ‘so hot’ and had ‘sexy eyes’.
‘I told him I was a stewardess as it meant I wasn’t always contactable,’ she told The Times.
‘It was hard as this man murdered my aunty. I had nightmares when we were messaging each other.’
The pair arranged a date in Johannesburg, and Ms Sergison contacted the South African police, hoping that they would organise a sting operation.
‘He wanted to speak to me on the phone so I spoke to the South African police and they got a female officer to contact him. But it didn’t work out,’ she told the paper.
After the first set up, she tried to contact him under more false names, but her messages were ignored.
In 2020, she wrote a Facebook post declaring Imbayarwo, who then went by the name Andrew Ndlovu, her aunt’s killer.
It read: ‘Six years ago today this man raped and murdered my aunt Christine Robinson. Andrew Ndlovu is still a free man enjoying his life after taking hers.’
Ms Robinson’s niece, Lehanne Sergison, now 51, spent years writing to her aunt’s killer online and tried to set up a sting operation with South African police. Pictured, Christine and Daniel Robinson
Christine Robinson and her sister Diane, Lehanne’s mother. After her husband’s death Ms Robinson had said she wanted to sell the ranch rather than run it alone
The couple married in 2005, she was aged 50, he was 57
The pair decided to settle in South Africa and open a ranch after falling in love with the countryside in 2002
Lehanne Sergison (left) with her aunt in 1980. Ms Sergison kept in touch with the ranch staff to learn more about the killer’s whereabouts after her aunt’s death
Ms Sergison created a false identity on Facebook under the name of Missy Falcao — a combination of her dogs’ names — and connected with some of Imbayarwo’s friends before contacting him. Pictured, her aunt’s game ranch in Limpopo
More than 70,000 people shared the post, and it was picked up by Ian Cameron, an anti-crime activist in South Africa.
Mr Cameron was approached by Imbayarwo’s then employer, and arrested at his Johannesburg staff accommodation a few hours later.
Ms Sergison said tears were shed after she got the call to say Imbayarwo had been arrested.
She said that she kept going with her online manhunt for so many years, because her aunt was ‘such a wonderful woman’.
‘I know everybody always says that but she really was,’ she told the paper.
Ms Robinson was a former teacher from Liverpool. She bought the game park, located near the Botswana border, with her husband Daniel, also known as Robbie, in 2002. She continued to run the 30-guest lodge after his death in 2012.
Imbayarwo claimed he had a sexual relationship with Ms Robinson during his trial, and denied a range of charges including murder and rape.
