Trevor Noah’s stepfather shot his mother in the head: ‘He tried to kill the family’

THE Daily Show host knows a thing or two about resilience and strength. It’s a trait he learned from his mother, who was shot in the head by his stepfather.

TREVOR Noah knows a thing or two about resilience and strength. It’s a trait he learned from his mother, Patricia Noah, who was shot in the head by his stepfather.

Talking with People, the host of The Daily Show, 33, recalls asking his mother why she didn’t leave.

“She said, ‘Because if I leave, he will kill us,’” Noah said. “I said to her, ‘That’s extreme. I don’t think that’s real.’ I thought she was being overly dramatic; I didn’t understand it, and she left, and as I talk about it in [my] book, within a matter of a few years, he tried to kill the family.”

Noah wrote about his stepfather’s abuse in his memoir, Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood.

The Daily Show host witnessed shocking domestic violence growing up in South Africa. Picture: Getty

An adult Noah remembers getting a call from his brother, who said that their stepfather had shot their mother following the couple’s divorce. The bullet entered the back of her head and exited through her nose — narrowly missing her brain.

“I remember after the shooting, my mother was in the hospital, and all I felt was rage,” he said. “My mother said to me, ‘Don’t hate him for doing this, but rather pity him because he too is a victim, in his own way, of a world that has thrust upon him an idea of masculinity that he has subscribed to and is now part of. As for myself, I do not wish to imbue myself with a hatred that only I will carry.’”

Noah says he didn’t initially understand her thoughts, that it took some time for them to sink in. “I think watching my mom, her growth post-shooting, our family and the way we became strong, really became the example that I chose to live by,” he said. “That’s really what I’ve stuck to, and that’s how I try to live my life every day.”

Noah’s stepfather was convicted of attempted murder, but was only sentenced to probation.

This story originally appeared on the New York Post and is republished here with permission.

Originally published as Trevor Noah’s stepfather shot his mother in the head: ‘He tried to kill the family’