Child kidnapping suspects denied bail
|Published
File photo File photo
Durban - A Durban couple charged with kidnapping street children, allegedly for the purposes of sexual exploitation, have been denied bail.
The Hillary man and his girlfriend, a freelance journalist, were arrested almost two weeks ago as a result of investigations initiated by I Care, a non-profit organisation that helps street children.
The couple, both 32, have not yet pleaded to charges of rape, kidnapping and exposing or displaying their genitals and cannot be named.
The man had claimed at a bail hearing in the Durban Magistrate’s Court last week that he had been doing his bit for humanity when he took the street children home and provided them with food and shelter. In return they were to protect his property from criminals, he said, but one of them stole from him and another torched his granny flat.
However, the court found his explanation to be unreasonable given that he repeatedly took in street children, despite the theft and fire.
“Had he (the accused) been reasonable, he would have gone to the police and told them about the minor boys he kept at his home,” magistrate CM Mkhaliphi said on Friday.
During cross-examination, prosecutor Naushaad Harripershad put it to the man on Friday that there was a clear pattern of his taking street children to his home.
The accused replied: “Most of them came to my gate. There is no pattern. I’m not some psychopath,” he said, fidgeting with his shirt and stretching his arms before being told by the court orderly to remain still in the witness box.
Three boys – two aged 15 and one 13 – identified the man, when he was arrested by the Bellair SAPS, as the person who had picked them up from the street and promised them employment. The boys alleged they were locked in a granny flat and regularly assaulted.
The court had heard how one of the boys was forced by the man to touch his girlfriend on her private parts and when he did not comply, he was beaten.
The court had heard that in April last year four boys were picked up from the street and held captive for weeks in a granny flat until they escaped.
In her evidence led by way of an affidavit, the woman said she was self-employed and earned R5 000 a month as a freelance journalist. She said she intended on pleading not guilty.
The magistrate rejected the submission by defence lawyer Mfanafuthi Biyela that the court should look at the State’s evidence with caution.
Biyela said the court had not been made aware of the credibility or qualifications of I Care’s private investigator, who he argued was motivated by financial gain.
Mkhaliphi said the fact that the person who testified, referring to investigating officer Sergeant Samantha Paul, was not part of the original investigation, did not mean the evidence could not be considered.
“The government has gone to some lengths to promulgate legislation to protect children and therefore the ages of the children have to be taken into account,” he said before denying the applications for bail.
Daily News