No prosecutor, no magistrate: Krejcir delay case stalls

An application brought by convicted Czech crime boss Radovan Krejcir to have his long-running fraud trial struck off the roll for unreasonable delay was itself delayed again on Wednesday, after neither the prosecutor nor the presiding magistrate arrived at the Palm Ridge Magistrate’s Court.

Krejcir’s attorney, Kerishni Pillay of Otrebski Attorneys, said the state gave no explanation for the absence of prosecutor Mr Shabalala, who had himself secured the September date two months earlier on the grounds that he was unavailable in July.

“We were unable to proceed because the prosecutor was not in court. We had no reason as to why he was not in court. Further to that, the magistrate was also not in court as her contract had ended for this matter,” Pillay told Africa Daily.

She said that the parties were moved from court nine to court eight, where brief submissions were heard before the matter was provisionally postponed to 14 October to secure a date for the section 342A proceedings.

Section 342A of the Criminal Procedure Act allows a court to investigate delays in criminal proceedings that are unreasonable and prejudicial, and to make orders ranging from a refusal of further postponements to striking the matter from the roll.

Krejcir brought the application in connection with a 2013 fraud, forgery and money laundering case in which he and four co-accused are alleged to have falsified documents purporting to come from the Central Bank of Swaziland to the South African Reserve Bank, securing payments totalling R7.5 million.

The state has rejected his complaint, saying the delays are of his own making and that it has been ready to proceed since 2018.

Pillay said that none of Krejcir’s outstanding requests had been attended to in the almost two months since the last appearance.

“There was no medical attention or treatment given to him. He was brought to court only at 11:am with no food. We requested that his shackles be removed as he was sitting in the court and they refused that, even though the other magistrate does it. Further to that, he’s unable to make any legal or medical calls. And I mean, the purpose of a 342A is for unreasonable delays. They brought him in only at 11 o’clock. The state is constantly causing delays,” she said.

Krejcir is serving a 35-year sentence in the C-Max section of the Kgosi Mampuru II Correctional Centre in Pretoria for convictions including attempted murder, kidnapping and drug dealing.

His conditions of detention have been a recurring feature of the proceedings, in July he refused to continue testifying after telling the court that correctional officials had given him expired bread and juice, despite a wheat allergy and a prescribed therapeutic diet.