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When Elie Challita started dating his three-year-old daughter’s teacher, Amber Lee Hughes, he thought he had found the perfect partner: sweet, nurturing, good with kids. But a year later, his precious daughter was dead and he was somehow accused of raping and drowning her.
“When my friends asked me what she did, and I told them she was a babies’ teacher, all they could say was: ‘What more could you ask for? She couldn’t be with anyone safer!'” Elie Challita told News24 while outside the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg, as the trial of 25-year-old Amber Lee Hughes got underway.
Now that same woman, once trusted to care for his child, is standing trial for her murder.
“Who could expect that from a 24-year-old preschool teacher?” the grieving father said.
In January 2023, Challita’s daughter, Nada-Jane, was found dead, face-down in a bathtub, in the Glenvista home she shared with her father and Hughes. She was just four years old. A child full of life, gone in silence and water. There was also evidence of sexual assault, per George Herald.
Dr Hestelle van Staden, an expert in forensic pathology, testified about her findings during the autopsy, confirming that the child’s cause of death was asphyxiation (when the body is starved of oxygen) and sexual assault.
She detailed the injuries sustained by the little girl, including facial injuries and injuries to both her front and back private parts, as well as slits on both her wrists.
At the time, Challita had been in Polokwane, exploring a new job opportunity and viewing real estate, trying to build a future for himself and his daughter. Back in Glenvista, Hughes was alone with Nada-Jane, who was meant to be safe.
But the calm was a lie. Beneath the surface, an undue fury was brewing.
He and Hughes were fighting over text, the tension as thick as knives. One of Hughes’ messages landed like a curse: “You broke my heart. I’m going to bum yours. How could you do that to me?”
Alarm bells went off in Challita’s head. Something wasn’t right. Desperate, he asked a friend to go check on his daughter. What that friend found was a scene no one should ever witness: a tiny child, face down in a bathtub, unresponsive.
Paramedics tried to save her, but they couldn’t, and Nada-Jane was declared dead. A post-mortem also found evidence of sexual assault.
Challita was the first witness to testify on Monday. Speaking afterwards, he said it had been a gruelling experience. “It’s torturous.” he said “To stand there and relive all those moments – it’s very traumatising.”
On the stand, Challita recounted how he first crossed paths with Hughes in late 2021, when he enrolled his daughter in a Bedfordview preschool where she worked. “I was a single father at that time, and the accused offered help if and when I needed it with my child,” he explained. She seemed kind, even affectionate, sending Nada-Jane home with handwritten notes, decorated with hearts. “She used to tell me: ‘Look in the agenda, there’s something for you,'” he said.
It seemed harmless. Even sweet. And soon, their bond turned romantic. But the fairytale was short-lived.
The relationship spiralled into something far darker, riddled with jealousy, volatility, and constant fighting. According to Challita, Hughes didn’t just resent his time with his daughter, she fixated on it. The tension escalated into outright hatred.
Challita told the court that the day his daughter died began with something small, but it didn’t stay that way. Hughes was furious that he hadn’t kissed her goodbye that morning, and from there, the argument snowballed.
By the time they were texting, she was accusing him of cheating. The messages, read aloud in court, painted a picture of obsession and unravelling control. Challita said he tried to calm her down, but she wouldn’t let go. “I was apologising. I was asking the accused to discuss the disagreement when I got home,” he said.
Then came her threat, ice-cold and unforgettable: she told him she would kill Nada-Jane. That was six months before the little girl ended up dead.
She allegedly told him: “I’ll show you how I am going to kill your f***king child.”
Hughes had made threats before, vile, violent ones. Still, Challita didn’t believe she’d ever cross the line.
“In my mind, I was saying she would get angry and say things she doesn’t mean, like everyone else. But this one meant every word she said,” he told News24.
In the devastating aftermath of Nada-Jane’s death, Challita and the child’s mother, Amy Johnson, found their way back to each other, united by grief too heavy to carry alone. They sat side by side in court, hands tightly clasped as he relived the fragments of a life stolen far too soon.
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He spoke of his daughter with aching tenderness, of how she loved animals, and how each birthday, they’d catch tiny finches only for her to gently release them, one by one, into the open sky. She adored fishing too, just like him.
But now, he’s a father without a child, and he wants Hughes to face the consequences even though he also knows the harshest sentence won’t change what’s already been lost.
“I could have another 10 children; it’s not going to be her; it’s not going to bring that specific baby back. No money, no time, no children can bring her back.”
Hughes, meanwhile, continues to deny everything. She pleaded not guilty, claiming in a plea statement that Nada-Jane’s death was a tragic accident. She said she left the child unattended in the bath and came back to find her lifeless.
She offered no explanation for the signs of sexual assault.
[Source: News24]
