Senior bank manager in statutory rape storm

Angelique Serrao

JOHANNESBURG: A senior manager at a bank is facing a charge of statutory rape after he allegedly had a sexual relationship with his stepdaughter since she was 12 years old.

The man’s ex-wife and mother of the girl – now aged 15 – has also laid a complaint with his employer, Investec Bank, after he forwarded her numerous e-mails containing pornography, which had been distributed to other senior staff at the bank.

The man, who is in his sixties, cannot be named in order to protect the identity of the child. She has been put in a place of safety.

The accused was arrested after the mother allegedly found sexually explicit messages on her laptop between her then husband and daughter.

The case is before the Randburg Magistrate’s Court, but has been postponed in order for a report to be submitted by the police’s Cyber Crimes Unit, which is investigating the case.

The man is out on R10 000 bail.

The man’s advocate, Mannie Witz, said there were problems with the case as no formal charge sheet had yet been placed before the court.

“This is a very acrimonious matter,” Witz said in reference to the relationship between the man and the mother.

Aside from the criminal charges, the mother has also laid complaints at Investec Bank for e-mails her ex-husband allegedly forwarded from his work account .

The e-mails were from a senior manager who allegedly sent sexually explicit videos and pictures to at least five other senior bank employees in 2011.

One e-mail, with the subject “Financials”, contained a video titled “Indian style”, with a man and woman having sex. Another e-mail, called “Financial crisis”, had a video titled “boobs in the bathtub”. A third, “Scandalicious!”, had pictures of women in various stages of undress.

The mother asked Investec to investigate the circulation of the e-mails by employees.

“There have been other mails of a sexually explicit nature that have also been forwarded to me which will further prove that this was not a once-off error in judgment, but what has become the ‘norm’ for certain employees,” she wrote in a complaint.

“I have also found out that the circulation of pornography at corporates is not taken lightly… I am not a prude, but I do believe that people are meant to perform their duties at Investec instead of circulating such explicit content.”

Investec Group human resources spokesperson Marc Kahn said

the mother’s recent allegations were forensically investigated.

“The audit showed that the original e-mail… had been sent by one individual to several colleagues, including the husband, in 2011. Based on the findings, the individual concerned would have faced disciplinary action. However, he left the bank in 2014.”

Kahn said their investigation found no evidence that any of the e-mail’s recipients violated the bank’s policies because they did not circulate the material they had received.

“Only… (the woman’s) husband forwarded the e-mail, and just to her. Correspondence between spouses is deemed private and not in violation of our policy,” he said.