Legal Articles and Guides

The Constitutional Court has ruled against a US widow who lodged a R24m damages claim against owners of a shark cage diving operation after her husband drowned when the diving boat he was on capsized off Kleinbaai in 2008. Sarah Tallman’s application for leave to appeal a SCA decision exonerating a shark cage diving operation of negligence, resulting in her husband’s death, has been dismissed with costs, says a Cape Times report. Her husband Chris was one of three tourists who drowned after a White Shark Projects catamaran-hull ski boat, Shark Team, capsized after being hit by a wave off Kleinbaai on 13 April, 2008. Tallman instituted a R24m claim against skipper Grant Tuckett and White Shark Projects. In 2014, Western Cape High Court Judge Alec Freud found Tuckett and White Shark Projects to be liable on the basis that they were negligent, but the SCA overturned the ruling, deciding the experienced Tuckett could not have anticipated the ‘freak wave’ that did the damage.  

It's been a tough few days for deputy prosecutions head, Nomgcobo Jiba, who could be excused for feeling she has a target on her chest, notes Legalbrief. Having escaped a DA bid to have her suspended when the Western Cape High Court decided a week ago that President Jacob Zuma had not acted irrationally in deciding not to suspend her, she found herself in the firing line again this week – this time in the Gauteng High Court – as she sought to deflect a concerted effort by the General Council of the Bar (GCB) to have her struck off the roll of advocates.

In a move seen by the doubters as the NPA being drawn into President Jacob Zuma's 'Stalingrad strategy' to delay as long as possible the day when he will have to face up to corruption charges, National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP) Shaun Abrahams did what everybody who has been following the matter expected he would do – appeal the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) ruling setting aside the 'irrational' decision to drop the charges, reports Legalbrief. Interestingly, he left it to the last legal minute, as did Zuma, as they announced their decisions to seek the court's permission to challenge the ruling of a three-judge Bench in favour of the DA's motion to reinstate the long-ago abandoned 783 corruption and fraud charges the President may yet avoid having to face. Zuma was a winner in another NPA matter in the Western Cape High Court this week, but whether that signals a change in fortunes remains to be seen. We'll know more on June 10 when the High Court will hear the NPA and Zuma's applications for leave to appeal.  

As he bowed out of office last Friday, Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke said the judiciary was safe in the hands of Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng, notes a BDlive report. At Moseneke’s farewell function at the Constitutional Court, both spoke of the importance of putting the institution first – in what the report describes as an unprecedented public affirmation of the unity of the judiciary and its highest court. Moseneke said despite their ‘initial discomfort’, he and Mogoeng had ‘found each other’. ‘Each time there was a storm that swelled around this institution, you and me stood firm,’ he said to Mogoeng. ‘I can say without any fear of contradiction that your integrity has been shown to be beyond question.’ However, Moseneke warn ed Mogoeng that there was ‘much turbulence ahead’. However a ‘good pilot’ navigated that kind of turbulence and Mogoeng had his full confidence, he said.