Double murder suspect Ruth Lawrence to be extradited this month from SA to Ireland to face charges

Irish detectives are scheduled to fly to South Africa in 10 days’ time to escort double murder suspect Ruth Lawrence back to Dublin to face trial.

Fugitive Ruth, 42, has already spent six-and-a-half months behind bars in a South African jail after her dramatic arrest following nine years on the run.

The high-profile prisoner will be released into the custody of a team of Gardai officers in Johannesburg, then flown home in handcuffs.

It has taken since last October 4 – when Lawrence was arrested in a dawn raid by the elite South African police unit The Hawks-  to extradite her.

Spokesperson for the South African Department of Justice Chrispin Phiri confirmed:

“The Minister Mr Ronald Lamola has approved extradition.

“The paperwork has been signed for formal extradition to take place and Lawrence will be handed to the Irish police to be returned to Ireland.

“Her co-accused Neville van der Westhuizen is currently serving 15 years in South Africa for culpable homicide and will serve his sentence first.

“When he has completed his sentence then the Interpol extradition warrant against him will be acted upon and an extradition case will be heard”.

Lawrence is alleged to have fled Dublin in 2014 with her 40-year-old South African lover van der Westhuizen, after two local men were both shot dead.

It is believed the couple had run up debts to a Dublin drugs gang, and that when two pals went around to collect a five-figure sum both were executed.

Friends Eoin O’Connor, 32, and Anthony Keegan, 33, were found buried in a shallow grave and post mortems showed they were shot in the head.

An Interpol Warrant was issued for the arrest of Lawrence and Van der Westhuizen who were by then living under the radar in South Africa.

The two professional tattooists are believed to have split up in 2015 with Lawrence working in Johannesburg, Pretoria and finally Bloemfontein.

She had dyed her long blonde hair black and cheekily, whilst on the run from the cops, used the name Ruth LAWLESS to work in ink parlours.

But her luck ran out in October last year after the Irish Director of Public Prosecutions issued a new arrest warrant to try and trace the fugitives.

South African Police already had Van der Westhuizen under lock and key as he had been convicted in 2020 of the culpable homicide of a teenager.

The tattooist was sentenced to 15 years at Durban High Court for the crime as well as kidnapping and GBH which ended with the death of the victim.

Lawrence was picked up after a tip-off that she was laying low at a smart suburban hideaway in Bloemfontein, behind electric security gates.

Prime suspect Ruth gave no resistance and admitted who she was, and has been held in custody ever since at the Bainsvlei Police holding cells.

At her first court appearance Lawrence chose not to apply for bail and said she wanted to be extradited to Ireland and would even pay the air fare.

Since December when the extradition paperwork was completed between the South African Police and Irish Gardia she has been awaiting return.

This month the SA Minister of Justice Ronald Lamola signed and rubber stamped the extradition paperwork meaning the Irish police can take her.

Lawrence from Clontarf, N Dublin, will be formally charged – when she touches down on Irish soil – with murdering O’Connor and Keegan in April 2014.

It is thought both men were shot in the head at close range, either in the Dublin home she and Van der Westhuizen were renting, or close by.

Detectives believe the couple rowed, with the bodies, to a nearby island on a lake just off Cavan and buried them in a shallow grave.

Six weeks later a local butcher was fishing nearby and recognised the smell of rotting flesh, and called out the Gardia who then found the two men’s bodies.

Lawrence and van der Westhuizen were apparently drawn together by their passion for tattoos and did their inking apprenticeships together.

The alleged killer couple were taught how to tattoo ghoulish and macabre figures onto the bodies of clients who paid them well for their inkwork.

Van der Westhuizen is going through an extradition case at Durban High Court but there is no extradition deal between Ireland and South Africa.

A National Prosecuting Authority spokesman said: “As Ruth Lawrence did not object to extradition then it was relatively easy to do the paperwork. But Van der Westhuizen has a sentence to serve before his extradition”.

South African Police will drive Lawrence in handcuffs and leg shackles 250 miles from the Bansvlei holding cells in Bloemfontein to Johannesburg.

Irish police will fly from Dublin on May 21 to Johannesburg, then complete the legal paperwork and return home with fugitive Lawrence on May 24.

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