Kimberley – Police are still searching for the suspect who shot a man and raped a woman at the notorious “lovers’ den” on Barkly Road last month.
A Galeshewe man was shot several times and his partner was allegedly raped twice by the unknown suspect, who surprised them while they were romancing at the popular spot just past Lerato Park on Barkly Road.
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Cape Town – A bookkeeper accused of defrauding a tourist company appeared in the Bellville Specialised Commercial Crime Court in Cape Town on Thursday.
Michelle Louter, 46, of Gordon’s Bay, was not asked to plead when she appeared before magistrate Sabrina Sonnenberg, charged with 123 counts of fraud involving R455 054.
The crimes took place between April 2003 and April 2010.
Prosecutor Denver Combrink alleges she defrauded the company Southern Africa PGA Tours, of Somerset West. According to the charge sheet, her duties included the electronic capture and payment of supplier invoices.
All payments had to be authorised by herself, and the company’s financial manager.
According to the charge sheet, the post of financial manager was often vacant, or the financial manager was absent from office. On such occasions Louter allegedly authorised payments herself, but diverted the money to her own bank account.
She was warned to appear in court again on September 26.
Sapa
Cape Town – The power given to the executive over the Hawks investigative unit is concerning, the Helen Suzman Foundation told the Western Cape High Court on Thursday.
David Unterhalter, for the foundation, said their concerns related to appointments within the unit and whether political involvement and oversight resulted in insufficient insulation from interference.
“Who is doing the appointing but, equally, what sort of power is being granted to that person and particularly, the over-breadth and discretion that is allowed…?” he asked.
“The executive may be the subject of investigation.”
He argued that while Parliament had oversight in terms of the legislation, it would be limited to receiving a report on an appointment.
The foundation seeks an order declaring sections of the SA Police Service Amendment Act inconsistent with the Constitution to the extent that they fail to secure adequate independence for the Hawks.
It wants the court to suspend the declaration of constitutional invalidity for 12 months in order for Parliament to remedy the defect in accordance with the court’s judgment in the matter.
The amendment act was drafted in reaction to a previous Constitutional Court victory by businessman Hugh Glenister, in which the executive was ordered to change the legislation to provide the Hawks with independence from political interference, among other things.
Glenister brought his suit following the dissolution of the Scorpions, an investigative unit under the National Prosecuting Authority, in 2008. The Scorpions were replaced by the Hawks, which fell under the Saps.
Glenister and the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF) approached the Constitutional Court separately in November last year to oppose the amendments, arguing they were still insufficient.
Direct access to the Constitutional Court was denied and the two parties agreed to appear before a full Bench of high court judges at the same time and present their arguments.
Unterhalter said the court had the duty to abide by the Constitutional Court’s previous judgment and make sure the amendments were in line with the Constitution.
“This is simply an exercise of constitutional law, taking a constitutional standard and applying it to a piece of legislation,” he said.
“Nothing about the enquiry is fact-determined.”
He was referring to an argument brought by Glenister’s lawyer Paul Hoffman earlier on Thursday.
Hoffman said a key question to ask was whether it was responsible to keep the Hawks within the control of police “under the circumstances”.
Judge Judith Cloete asked what circumstances he was referring to.
Hoffman replied it was the “facts” on the extent of corruption in government and state security bodies, as supported by his expert witnesses in affidavits.
“It’s the factual circumstances of the executive, the SAPS and the pre-2012 Hawks, the un-turbo-charged Hawks,” he said.
Judge Siraj Desai said it could not be expected for these opinions to be taken as facts.
He criticised Hoffman for attempting to “defame” ANC national executive committee member Tony Yengeni and Hawks head Anwa Dramat by alluding to media allegations and who they were connected to, in his heads of argument handed in before the hearing.
“The purpose of the allusion is to show there have been no steps by the Hawks against Yengeni,” Hoffman countered, in reference to allegations that Yengeni signed a R6 million bribe agreement with a bidder during South Africa’s arms deal.
Hoffman said an anti-corruption entity should be impregnable to any external influence or interference.
“Securing (the adequate degree of independence) should be used in such a sense as entrenching or rendering impregnable,” he said.
“The scheme of the 2012 legislation does not achieve a state, a structure or an operational environment in which the Hawks are so ‘secured’. This is unconstitutional. They ‘fall under’ the police hierarchy and are not adequately independent.”
He suggested the legislation should allow for the Hawks to be outside of executive control, and to be given independence in the same manner as the judiciary and the National Prosecuting Authority, for example.
Arguments continue on Friday.
Sapa
Parliament – A total of 449 police officials have been fired over the past year for crime, according to Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa.
In written reply to a parliamentary question, he suggested the figure could rise even higher because “many of the criminal matters that occurred since January (this year) may not as yet have been finalised by the NPA and investigators”.
Mthethwa was responding to the question, “What is the total number of police officials who have been found to be involved in criminal activities since January 1, 2013?”.
It was posed by Inkatha Freedom Party MP Velaphi Ndlovu.
According to Mthethwa: “The number of police officers who have been fired as a result of crimes they committed 2012-2013, was 449.”
It is not clear whether Mthethwa was referring to the 2012/13 financial year (from April 1, 2012, to end March this year) or the 2012 calendar year and the current one, to date.
His reply comes after a two-year audit of the police revealed last month that 1448 current police employees had committed crimes.
“The audit established that 1448 members have criminal offences,” Mthethwa said in a statement at the time.
Sapa
Pretoria – Three men were arrested in Nelmapius, east of Pretoria, on Thursday in connection with car theft, police said.
A tip-off led to their arrest, said Captain Pinky Tsinyane.
When police arrived at the given address, four men made a run for it. Police cornered three, but the fourth escaped. Three suspected stolen cars were found when police searched the yard.
The three men, aged between 27 and 36, are expected to appear in the Pretoria Magistrate’s Court soon on charges of possession of suspected stolen goods.
Sapa
Johannesburg – An unannounced visit by police to the offices of a Johannesburg newspaper was deeply concerning, the SA National Editors’ Forum (Sanef) said on Thursday.
Police visited the offices of The Star newspaper on Wednesday, Sanef said in a statement.
“During the visit by detectives of the Hillbrow police station, The Star’s editor Makhudu Sefara was asked to provide a warning statement to the police about the newspaper’s ‘battle with Pikitup’.”
Sefara “rightfully” declined to co-operate and referred the detectives to the newspaper’s lawyers.
Sanef said The Star had been reporting on allegations of corruption and fraud within Pikitup, the City of Johannesburg’s waste management company.
The newspaper recently published several reports about irregularities at Pikitup based on a confidential report seen by its reporters.
The Sunday Times was also visited unannounced last week, with the newspaper’s lawyer called to a meeting, with the police leaving after a “robust discussion”.
“Senior Sunday Times staff experienced the unannounced visit as intimidatory and inappropriate,” Sanef said.
“Police returned by appointment on Monday to take a statement in which the Sunday Times stated that the report was legally acquired and would not be surrendered.”
Sanef said it was Pikitup’s constitutional right to take lawful action if it felt it had been wronged.
However, it was also the public’s right to know if public money had been squandered by Pikitup with it being the media’s duty and right to expose such misappropriation.
“The SAPS cannot arrive unannounced at a newspaper’s office and demand warning statements from journalists without even informing the editor about the basis of the complaint,” Sanef said.
“The only possible interpretation of this visit is that it was an attempt to intimidate The Star and its reporters.”
Sanef said it would express its concerns about police conduct with the office of national police commissioner General Riah Phiyega.
Sapa
Phokeng, North West – The deaths of two men reported to be shop stewards within the Association of Mineworkers and Construction (AMCU) was unrelated to labour union unrest, North West police said on Thursday.
Brigadier Thulani Ngubane said police attended a crime scene on Saturday at an informal settlement in Phokeng, near Rustenburg.
He said police believed, following preliminary investigations, that the two deaths were as a result of a quarrel arising from a social gathering that took place the weekend before.
At the time of the incident, the two men were also in the company of another man and a girlfriend of one of the men. They were both unharmed.
“The incident is not related at all to the situation within the labour unions or the mining sector,” said Ngubane.
“It is disingenuous for anybody to suggest that the incident in question is related to the labour unions or mining. They are not related.”
Amcu president Joseph Mathunjwa was not immediately available for comment.
Sapa
Matibidi – Two men were killed when a light aircraft crashed in Matibidi, Mpumalanga, on Thursday, paramedics said.
“The men had died when the provincial health helicopter arrived at the scene,” ER24 spokesman Werner Vermaak said.
The aircraft crashed into the bushes near Potholes in Matibidi. The cause of the accident was not known.
Mpumalanga police spokesman Colonel Leonard Hlathi confirmed the crash and the deaths and said they were investigating.
Sapa
Advocate Dali Mpofu has effectively stolen the limelight from Marikana miners and their families, says Nathan Geffen.
Pretoria – I enjoy lawyer jokes, but in my time with the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) the lawyers I worked with didn’t fit the stereotype. They often represented TAC pro bono or at reduced fees. They put money aside to fight for justice, especially for poor people. They were also modest. In our high profile cases, the TAC’s lawyers were not the centre of attention. Nevertheless, TAC won most of its cases and all the key ones. We were very ably represented.
In TAC’s litigation, people living openly with HIV, like Hazel Tau and Zackie Achmat, were the main focus of media attention. That was achieved through deliberate effort and made strategic sense.
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Cape Town – The DA says on its website that it has “received notification from the lawyers acting for President Jacob Zuma that they intend to apply for leave to appeal the decision of the North Gauteng High Court, which had instructed the NPA to hand over the controversial spy tapes and all related memoranda within five days”.
The tape transcripts and other documents relate to an NPA decision in 2009 to drop corruption charges against President Jacob Zuma.
James Selfe of the DA says: “We are advised by our lawyers that their grounds for this appeal are flimsy and it remains unclear on what basis they can appeal at all. This can be therefore interpreted as nothing more than a delaying tactic, at the taxpayer’s expense, to prevent this crucial information from being made public.”
Charl du Plessis of City Press reports that Zuma’s lawyers have argued that the tapes, interceptions of telephone conversations between former NPA head Bulelani Ngcuka and Scorpions boss Leonard McCarthy, were “part and parcel” of confidential representations made by Zuma to the NPA. These confidential representations are protected and cannot be disclosed.
The existence of the tapes was made public by Zuma’s lawyer Michael Hulley.
The NPA then obtained declassified copies from the then National Intelligence Agency.
But last week Mathopo rejected Zuma’s argument, ruling that “[the NPA] has a duty to explain to the citizenry why and how [acting prosecutions head Mokotedi] Mpshe arrived at the decision to quash the criminal charges against [Zuma] in pursuance of its constitutional obligations.”
Mathopo ordered the NPA to file copies of the tapes within five days and also to make internal documentation of the NPA relating to the decision available to the DA’s lawyers on a confidential basis.
The DA says it will continue with the case “in defence of two hugely important principles: first that no-one, even the President, is above the law, and second, that the NPA must be able to do its job without fear, favour or prejudice. South Africa’s constitutional democracy depends on them”.
– News24
The Guardian 