Child porn accused stay behind bars

An accused hugged his wife who sat next to him in the dock on Tuesday after the Pretoria North Magistrate’s Court denied them and six of their family members bail.

Magistrate Pierre Wessels told the eight accused - arrested on December 2 for allegedly, among other charges, raping and producing pornography of their own children and grandchildren - that he could not ignore the community’s feelings.

However, he would not let the community prescribe his findings about bail.

The law stated that people accused of these crimes were not to be granted bail unless there were exceptional circumstances, he explained. If there were no such circumstances, the court did not have a discretion to grant bail.

“Child pornography is a serious charge, but the alleged rape of children is even more serious.

“There are statements of the two children who were removed from the foster care of accused 1 and 2 (the grandparents). They do not have contact with each other but they support each other’s statements.

“Each supplied very fine detail about how, where and when they were raped,” said Wessels.

This was confirmed by medical evidence and assessments, he said.

Referring to the grandparents, the only two who took the stand, Wessels said they were some of the weakest and most unbelievable witnesses the court had seen.

“They contradicted themselves and each other.

“They adjusted their evidence when they were in a corner,” he said.

He recalled that the grandfather became aggressive at times and used foul language, also threatening the Christelike Maatskaplike Raad and dismissing the charges against them as “minor”.

The grandmother, Wessels found, used words in her statement that she herself did not even understand.

The investigating officer, on the contrary, gave a proper outline of the case to the court.

Wessels said the financial and personal circumstances of all the accused were no different from those of other accused.

Regarding the health of the grandfather and his brother, who claimed they had had heart attacks in prison, the magistrate said there was no medical evidence before court to support that.

In addition there were medical facilities in jail if they needed treatment.

Commenting on the fact that the brother laughed at some of the evidence in court, Wessels said: “I am no medical doctor but I cannot think that a person who had a heart attack could be in court the next day, as fit as a fiddle.”

Referring to the four biological children who were also removed when the family members were arrested, Wessels said he took the initiative to find out about questions raised by the defence.

It was confirmed that Children’s Court proceedings were on the way. The children were in a place of safety and an advocate had been appointed to represent them during these proceedings.

“This court must not decide today if you are guilty or not. The accused are regarded innocent until proven guilty,” said Wessels.

However, he found no exceptional circumstances to grant them bail.

This was when the grandfather’s brother put his arm around his wife, who shook her head.

The case was postponed to January 27 for further investigation and for the decision of the director of public prosecutions on where the case would go on trial.