Part of having faith in our country’s judicial system is the belief that alleged criminals, when appearing in court with a mountain of evidence against them, will have to answer the charges brought against them.

Unfortunately that isn’t the case for 39-year-old alleged child pornographer Roelof du Toit, whose charges were scrapped in Kimberley’s Barkly West Magistrate’s Court because the state ‘did not have its house in order’.

What is this mountain of evidence then? IOL lays it bare:

[He] was arrested in Kimberley in January 2014 on charges of possessing, manufacturing and distributing child pornography, as well as sexually assaulting children, after an American police agent, posing as a 15-year-old, started corresponding with him via e-mail.

It was reported at the time of his arrest that Du Toit was found living with a 12-year-old street child in his New Park home in Kimberley.

Du Toit’s e-mail address was apparently obtained after pornographic material was allegedly sent from his address to a network of more than 40 people involved in child pornography in America.

Pictures of the boy who was found living with Du Toit, had also allegedly been distributed by Du Toit.

The chlld also reportedly told police about another boy, aged 10, who was also allegedly molested and photographed by Du Toit.

According to the charge sheet, Du Toit faced one charge of sexual assault, two of compelled sexual assault, two of sexual grooming and two of compelled rape.

Sounds like there should be enough there to lock someone up (allegedly), but instead Roelof is walking free:

This ruling came after none of the witnesses, some hailing from the US, or the State prosecutor, Tshepo Sebego, were present in court on Tuesday.

The case was set down in February 2016 to commence on Tuesday, after four postponements since January 2014.

While the State requested yet another postponement, Du Toit’s legal representative, Advocate Sakkie Nel, opposed such a postponement, saying that his client had become “financially and emotionally drained” following the numerous postponements since his arrest.

Good job everyone, the poor guy is now (allegedly) emotionally drained. Where does this leave us moving forward then?

Magistrate Renier Pieterse scrapped the case from the court roll on Tuesday and ordered that it could only be placed back on the roll with written instruction from the Department of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

I wouldn’t hold my breath on that one.

[source:iol]

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