A 20-year-old man from Bulawayo’s Entumbane suburb jumped into a pond of raw sewage in a bid to escape an angry mob which was baying for his blood.
Thabani Ncube was caught in the very act of trying to rape a 60-year-old woman in a bushy area.
Ncube allegedly choked the elderly woman who fainted as he continued trying to undress her.
She was only rescued by a passerby who called out to residents to come and witness the attack.
Sensing danger, Ncube waded through a pond of untreated human waste but the crowd retrieved and bashed him before handing him over to the police.