Football icon Matthew Booth has been accused by his wife, Sonia, of breaking down the door to the bathroom she was hiding in from him in one of their violent domestic tiffs.
Sonia also opened a criminal case at Honeydew police station after the retired football legend followed her to her training session, unlocked and started rummaging through the cabby hole and armrest cubicle of her car.
The startling details are contained in the protection order Sonia applied for at the Roodepoort Magistrate’s Court in Joburg on November 10 last year.
In the protection order, which we have seen, Sonia said she had locked herself up in the bathroom of their Eagles Canyon Estate home in Joburg in a bid to bar the lanky footie from getting to her after one of their domestic squabbles. She said Matthew violently broke down the door and damaged its frame.
“Years ago he broke down our bathroom door I had locked to block him from getting to me.
“The sheer force he used to break down the door, damaging the frame, gave me an indication of the lengths he would go to get his way,” reads the application.
However, she did not elaborate in the application what triggered their fight, and what the former Bafana Bafana defender did after breaking down the door.
Sonia was narrating the hair-raising incident in her application as one of the reasons she wanted the order after Matthew followed her to her gym and allegedly opened her car with her spare keys and started searching in its armrest cubicle and cabby hole on November 9 last year.
She said she had hidden the car’s spare keys from the Supersport soccer analyst in their marital home. She said her estranged husband combed their pad and found the keys. He then drove to her gym and unlocked her vehicle and started ferreting around it.
“Unfortunately for him I walked out of the gym sooner than he expected. I noticed the cabby hole and armrest cubicle were wide open and my purse had been searched.
“I recorded the video and also posted a live feed on social media because I felt threatened, especially when he started walking towards my car,” reads the application.
Sonia said after the live recording, she opened a case of stalking against him at Honeydew police station.
“My husband’s stature intimidates me and I feel he uses that for the purpose of showing me “who’s boss”, reads her application for the protection order. Matthew, who turns 46 years on Tuesday, was ordered to go to the court on January 18 and show cause why the order should not be issued against him. “You are hereby called upon to give reasons why protection order should not be issued against you by the above mentioned court on the 18th day of January 2023. The court will issue a protection order against you if you do not appear in the court on the above mentioned date and time, and if the court is satisfied that the notice was properly served on you and that you have committed an act of domestic violence,” reads the order.
Sonia declined to comment. But her relative, who did not want to be named for fear of victimisation, told Sunday World that she withdrew the application on the day they were supposed to appear in court because her attorney was not available.
Also, said the kin, Sonia suffered a second mental breakdown in the court building.
This, said the relative, after she suffered the first mental breakdown, panic and anxiety attack on the day she was filling out the application form.
“That place and the process is soul destroying. She was there all day and she had nothing to eat nor drink, not that she had an appetite.
“Going back there to postpone due to her attorney not being available on the day, which was going to be the day of their first hearing, was torture and abuse all over again. She didn’t have the energy to continue with the back and forth, the process was draining physically and emotionally,” said the kin.
Added the next-of-kin: “Now she knows why the statistics around withdrawn/ dropped charges are so high. Imagine people who commute using public transport, having to wait outside the corridors as there is not enough seats, experiencing a breakdown in front of strangers.
“She had the luxury of her car and when she experienced the second mental breakdown, at least it was in privacy,” said the relative.
Booth was not available for comment.
– Sundayworld
