Assault threat: Brother of FF Plus councillor appears in court
|Published
Cape Town - Freedom Front Plus (FF+) City councillor Paul Jacobson’s brother Martin is out on a warning after making his first appearance in court for allegedly threatening to rape and kill a woman and her family.
Martin Jacobson briefly appeared in the Strand Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday where the case was postponed to April 5 for further investigation.
He faces a charge of threatening to assault.
In support of Cassia Souza, who lodged the complaint against Martin, the EFF’s Nazier Paulsen said: “I accompanied Cassia and her husband to Strand police station to lay a charge against him. The comment was made on Paul’s Facebook page and Paul gave the comment a thumbs up instead of admonishing his brother. Cassia is a pious and introverted person. She and her husband, Reza, have since been subjected to harassment and intimidation.”
Souza had replied to a Facebook post last month made by the councillor concerning South Africa approaching the International Court of Justice, to which Martin responded.
The woman commented that she was nauseated by Paul and said: “This man (the councillor) is nauseating, just like all of them spewing lies around, trying their best to justify indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians, pregnant mothers run over with bulldozers, graveyards turned upside down, actual babies left to rot on hospital beds, sick. It can’t get worse than what we’re seeing.”
Martin had responded: “Maybe I should send people to rape and murder your family and community. As was shown by Hamas videos. Let me come rape you and your daughters. Even your mother. Maybe we should. You guys are really so stupid to believe the propaganda. But I’m not going to change your mind.
“You’re basically anti-Semitic. That won’t change. But Israel will survive and that’s just how it is.”
Paul liked the comment his brother made and following complaints from other users, the post was deleted.
“Martin came at me with murder and rape of me and my children, who are minors and my mother and our community,” Souza said.
Martin told the Cape Argus that he misspoke when he wrote the comment.
“I was attempting to get across the message of how atrocious the violence of October 7 was to one particular person.
“In that moment I admittedly quite stupidly made the comments as I did, which is now on record, in order to try to get this person to understand how this atrocious violence would feel if it affected her and her family and community, as it was for countless people on October 7 and thereafter.
“What I should have done was to ask her how she would feel if rape was brought to her and her family and community. I apologise for my statement.”
mandilakhe.tshwete@inl.co.za