South Africa: ‘Keep McLeod behind bars’

Original Post Date: 2010-02-25 Time: 09:00:01  Posted By: News Poster

By Thandi Skade

While the police fought to keep Kenneth McLeod behind bars on kidnapping, housebreaking, robbery and car theft charges – calling him a danger to society – his advocate called the State’s case “preposterous”.

Yesterday marked day two of McLeod’s bail application, with investigating officer Inspector Lorraine Zitha opposing bail on the grounds that McLeod had sent his accuser, former friend Graham Nicholls, a “threatening” SMS, which made him fear for his life.

The officer said Nicholls had moved out of the Linbro Park, Sandton, residence where he was allegedly held up at gunpoint, gagged, tied and blindfolded before being kidnapped for 15 days by people allegedly commissioned by McLeod.
Continues Below ↓

She argued that McLeod had the “power to commit acts” against Nicholls and suggested the court set bail at R200 000.

In her evidence, Zitha said the police’s case was that McLeod had sent four armed men to Nicholls’s home in October last year to kidnap him and two female colleagues.

The alleged motive was to get Nicholls to sign over ownership of the Linbro Park house.

She said the victims were taken to an unknown location, where the two women were held for two days before being released.

Nicholls was held for an additional 13 days before he was set free.

Initially, she accused McLeod of having removed 30 cars from Nicholls’s residence, but later conceded that “some” of the 30 cars had been removed before the kidnapping. Zitha could not provide evidence that the cars removed from Nicholls’s premises were, in fact, his.

It also came to light that no missing persons case had been opened with the police. Nicholls opened a case against McLeod only on November 14, nearly a month after his release by the alleged kidnappers.

McLeod’s advocate, Nigel Riley, said there was nothing threatening about McLeod’s SMS. It read along the lines that when he (McLeod) got bail, he and Nicholls needed to sit down and sort things out, Riley told the court.

Responding to the alleged motive for the kidnapping, Riley said it was “complete and utter nonsense” and improbable that a person whose kidnappers were looking to take over ownership of his house would not inform them that the house did not belong to him.

Riley said his client, a Scottish immigrant, was not a flight risk and would hand over his passport.

McLeod and Nicholls, who used to be friends, had a big fallout. McLeod claims he lent Nicholls R2,7-million, while Nicholls maintains it was him who gave McLeod R2m.

Nicholls has also claimed that McLeod stole vintage cars from him, but McLeod insists they were given to him to settle his debt.

Judgment in McLeod’s bail application was expected in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court today.