Legal Articles and Guides

There will be no felling of pine trees in lower Tokai until at least the first quarter of next year after judgment was held over in the Western Cape High Court, notes a Cape Argus report. Judge Pat Gamble, who heard the case brought by Parkscape against forestry company Mountains to Oceans (MTO) and SA National Parks (SANParks), claiming they had contravened the Tokai Cecilia Management Framework, said judgment would only be expected next year as he had other matters to attend to.

In what a report in The Mercury calls a ground-breaking judgment for couples married in community of property but divorced, the Supreme Court of Appeal has ruled that pensions fall into their joint estate and form part of half of the assets each party would receive. Pretoria divorce lawyer Selwyn Shapiro said that prior to this judgment, there were conflicting judgments as to whether or not a pension interest automatically fell into a joint estate if the parties were married in community of property.

An application to be enrolled as an attorney of the High Court by an armed robber – and endorsed by the Cape Law Society – fell foul of Judge Clive Plasket in the Eastern Cape High Court (Grahamstown), who found Ntsikeleo Mdyogolo’s three different accounts of the incident ‘at odds with the ethical probity expected of an attorney’, amounting ‘to a cynical attempt to mislead both the Law Society and the court’, reports Legalbrief.

The Health Professions Council of SA's (HPCSA) Advocate Henry van Bergen told the SCA on Friday that High Court Judge Hans Fabricius’ ruling allowing court-sanctioned euthanasia had no legal value because Robin Stransham-Ford died hours before the ruling, notes a TimesLIVE report. Van Bergen argued that there was insufficient evidence that Stransham-Ford wanted to die.

The Council for the Advancement of the SA Constitution (Casac) – represented by Norton Rose Fulbright – has filed an application at the Constitutional Court challenging SA's withdrawal from the ICC, says a GroundUp report. The application was filed against President Jacob Zuma, the government and a number of government officials, including Minister of International Relations and Co-operation Maite Nkoana-Mashabane.

George businesswoman Monica Kruger – who lost R1.8m in an online banking fraud coupled with an illegal SIM swop – is fighting back against her bank and mobile service provider, demanding full disclosure of her account records. A Weekend Argus reports Kruger has launched a novel forensic attack on Absa and Vodacom, demanding key evidence on her accounts, including who at the bank had access to her profile and login prior to the fraud taking place.

The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality is suing a security firm and seven of the city’s current and former senior staff in the hope of recouping R92.4m spent on CCTV cameras for the beleaguered bus system in Port Elizabeth. According to a TimesLIVE report, the municipality believes the payments – ultimately approved by suspended corporate services boss Mod Ndoyana between November 2013 and September 2014 – were irregular and unlawful as there was no legal contract in place.

The Constitutional Court is to rule tomorrow on whether Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan – then Commissioner of SARS – had powers to fire a white employee for calling his supervisor a ‘kaffir’, says a report on the IoL site. According to evidence in the internal disciplinary hearing, the k-word comment was made after Jacobus Johannes Kruger had a heated argument with his supervisor, Amos Mboweni.

Real estate agent Penny Sparrow has unsuccessfully attempted to apply for leave to appeal an Equality Court judgment on her racist Facebook rant, says a News24 report. The Scottburgh Equality Court set aside her application – which it deemed irregular in terms of the court's rules – and ordered her to pay the ANC’s legal costs.

Five Rhodes University students spent most of their weekend behind bars after being arrested on charges ranging from assault to malicious damage to property after numerous incidents on the campus. A Daily Dispatch report says two of the students allegedly brawled with campus security guards early on Saturday morning, while a third allegedly later assaulted a woman police officer.

The father of Eli Barnard – whose face was mauled by a bull terrier which tried to grab a chicken thigh out of his mouth – is claiming R322 000 in damages from the dog’s owner. A Weekend Argus report says Eli is now six, but he was four when he was bitten. Marius Barnard told the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) that Martinus Ras knew his dog was vicious. Ras had a duty to ensure the dog could not escape from his backyard, where it was usually kept.

Did the family of cancer patient Robin Stransham-Ford – who won his court battle for assisted suicide – keep his death a secret so the court case could be concluded? The Times reports that is one of the questions the Health Professions Council of SA wants the SCA to consider as it decides whether terminally ill patients can use doctors to end their lives.

A full Bench of the Eastern Cape High Court (Grahamstown) has ruled that Bongile Nkola’s two properties can be sold off to settle a six-year-old debt he owes the Argent Steel Group, says a Daily Dispatch report. Nkola appealed against an earlier Eastern Cape High Court (East London) judgment, which declared two of his properties executable against the R2.8m debt his company School Furniture & Timber Products owed the Argent Steel group, which trades as Phoenix Steel.

Vicky Momberg may be expected to pay a R150 000 fine to the Equality Court, and has offered to plead guilty in the criminal case for her racist rant, but the state has insisted a trial date be set for the real estate agent. The Mercury reports Momberg became infamous when a video emerged of her verbally attacking police officers assisting her after she was hijacked, throwing around swear words and racial slurs.

The Gupta family may lose its recently-acquired Optimum Coal Mine. An eNCA report says multinational company Barloworld Equipment is threatening the mine with liquidation, claiming it is owed money for goods and services. A statement issued by Barloworld Equipment confirms that it has applied to a High Court for the liquidation of Optimum Coal Mine, which the Gupta family recently purchased.