Elderly man facing sex charges

2012-10-22 20:04

Cape Town - A businessman accused of indecently assaulting young girls walked in on one of his alleged victims, clad only in her panties, in a doctor's consulting room, the Parow Regional Court heard on Monday.

Johannes Adolf Kleinhans, 74, a former director of companies, was testifying in his own defence before Magistrate Amanda van Leeve.

He initially pleaded guilty to 94 counts. However, the court decided he had erred in doing so and changed his plea to not guilty when, in giving evidence, he blamed his three victims for his predicament.

He told the court the mother of one of his alleged victims told him one day the girl was seriously ill and was at a doctor's consulting room.

When he arrived there, the doctor was examining the girl, and he entered at the mother's invitation.

Kleinhans told the court: "I walked into the consulting room and there the girl was lying on a bench, clad only in her panties."

The magistrate said his presence in the privacy of the doctor's consulting room was "inappropriate", because he was not even related to the child.

Kleinhans told of another occasion when one of his alleged victims complained to him of an infection on her genitals, and asked him to take a photo of the infection. He told the court he did so, for her to see for herself.

He agreed with the magistrate that this too was inappropriate. He said he later offered the girl R5 for more photographs of her genitals. He denied that he had once slapped the girl, leaving a mark on her face.

"I know about my faults, and you can punish me for them, but not for slapping her face. I did not do it," he said.

Kleinhans said testimony was correct that his alleged victims often accompanied him to a house, which had been converted into a gymnasium, for exercise.

His lawyer Johan Grobler referred him to testimony that one of the girls saw him naked in the house, and that he was naked himself while photographing them in the nude.

He replied: "That is not true."

He denied claims that one of the girls saw him in the gym with an erection.

"I am in my 70s, and not capable of that," he said.

He admitted that the girls consumed liquor he had offered them.

Asked why he had done so, he replied: "I wanted to see if they could consume liquor in a responsible manner."

The case was postponed to 29 October, when Kleinhans would be cross-examined by prosecutor Herculine Swart.

It was not clear from the evidence how he knew the girls.

- SAPA