On 23 November 2006 the Supreme Court of Appeal upheld an appeal by Simon Mokoena, Wonder Mtshixa and Pieter Mokoena against the sentence imposed upon them by the Pretoria High Court.

All three were convicted together with a fourth, who has since died, by the High Court on two counts of murder. The convictions arose out of the killings of Frederick Pieter Van Zyl and his wife Carolina Van Zyl on 06 June 1995. The Van Zyls were shot and killed in their home, Plot 26 Linkholm in Vanderbijlpark.

The appellants had also appealed against their convictions on each of the murder charges. Those appeals were dismissed by the SCA. The High Court had sentenced each of the appellants to imprisonment for a term of 25 years in respect of each of the murder counts. Ten years of the sentence on the second count were ordered to run concurrently with the first in respect of the two Mokoenas and twelve years of the sentence on the second count were ordered to run concurrently with the first in respect of Mtshixa. The effective sentence was thus 40 years in respect of the former two and 38 years in respect of the latter.

The SCA accepted that the degree of disparity between the sentence imposed by the High Court and that which it would have imposed was such that interference was competent and required. It accordingly reduced the effective sentence of 40 years to 30 years and that of 38 years to 28 years.