Cops stole Harksen's money

2003-07-11 20:08

Cape Town - Two police inspectors who went on a spending spree with German currency found in a locker at the Health and Racquet Club in Green Point were found guilty in the Cape Town Regional Court on Friday of theft.

Jan Matthys Myburgh, 40, and Louis Francois de Jager, 37, appeared before magistrate Victor Gibson who postponed the case to October 24 when sentencing is to commence.

Although they were found guilty of stealing an "unknown" sum of German currency, prosecutor Johann Swanepoel contended in court that the state had proved that the locker had in fact contained Dm1254 000.

With the two men in the dock was Myburgh's mother, Martha Jacoba Myburgh, who was similarly found guilty of theft, as an "accessory after the fact".

Gibson said she had cleverly devised ways to spend the ill-gotten windfall without detection.

The money is believed to have been placed in the locker by Jeanette Harksen, wife of Jurgen Harksen.

The two men were arrested in April 1997, and their trial, with Myburgh's mother, started in August 1998.

Defence counsel Jan du Plessis told the court the money had belonged to Ms Harksen, who had given it to psychiatrist Leon Fourie, formerly of Constantia but now practising in the United Kingdom, with whom she had had an affair.

Myburgh and De Jager shared the money, after being assigned in October 1995 to investigate the discovery of a sports bag containing the money, hidden in a locker at the gym.

Myburgh's mother spent R75 000 of the money to buy a vehicle, knowing the money was stolen.

Swanepoel said Myburgh and De Jager had had to work together after stealing the money, "otherwise there was no way they could get away with it".

He said the most crucial evidence was that of former police reservist, Simo Petersen-Jessen, now in Australia, who had converted the money into rands.

The defence countered that there was no proof of ownership of the money, or how much had been in the sports bag.

Nor was there proof that the German currency converted by Petersen-Jessen was in fact part of the money found in the bag.

- SAPA