Lawyer spills beans on his clients

JP van der Veen says in his tell-all affidavit that he was left with no choice but to reveal his clients' alleged confessions after they accused him of being incompetent.

A Durban-based advocate has turned on his former clients, challenging the sacred rule of legal privilege and disclosing that they confessed their crimes to him.

JP van der Veen says in his “tell-all” affidavit, which came before Judge Gregory Kruger in the Pietermaritzburg High Court yesterday, that his former clients, Tracy-Anne Pretorius and her boyfriend, Tyronne Hofland, had already waived privilege in their application for a review of their convictions for drug dealing, in which they said he was incompetent and revealed details of consultations with him.

“They left me no choice,” Van der Veen told The Mercury yesterday.

“I sought advice from the most senior lawyers in Durban. I could not remain silent.”

Pretorius, Hofland, Travis Bailey, Bonzile Chutshela and Senzele Dlezi were convicted in November of dealing in dagga.

They were arrested in October 2010 after a raid at Pretorius’s Briar Lane, Durban North, home, where 44kg of dagga worth an estimated R2.2 million was found. The dagga was being cultivated in a laboratory in a concealed basement.

Magistrate N Kathrada ruled that while the State’s case had been circumstantial, the accused had not testified against it. But sentence was not passed because they launched the review application, claiming that Van der Veen was “totally incompetent”.

Pretorius said that the advocate, briefed by attorney Sarah Pugsley, had convinced her that she would be acquitted on the grounds that the charge against her was “defective and would not pass constitutional muster”, and that he had not bothered to hear their versions or put them to the court. But Van der Veen says that given the fact that they had confessed to him and had refused to plead guilty, he could conduct their defence only “on the basis of the interpretation of the definitions contained in the Drugs Act. I informed them that I could not run an affirmative defence, as I could not mislead the court… they were aware that we were facing a conviction in the magistrate’s court and, if they were to be acquitted, this would only happen on appeal.”

He said the “confessions” had been made during the first proper consultations with all accused at Pugsley’s office, when he was informed that a Steve Cope from Cape Town had provided R250 000 to set up the dagga cultivation business with Bailey, Pretorius and Hofland.

“I was told that once the R250 000 had been repaid, the profits were to be equally divided between the four. The modus operandi explained to me was that it took about 12 weeks to produce several kilograms of dagga, which was then packed in a box and posted to Cope in Cape Town. R50 000 was paid for each box. The business had been operating for 12 months before the arrests took place.”

Van der Veen said he had been told that Cope had said he would pay all legal fees, and he had met Cope in Cape Town. “He was not willing to pay the costs and said little about the case… He did, however, confirm what the accused had told me about the drug business.”

In a letter attached to his affidavit addressed to Pugsley dated January, the advocate complained about not being paid “while Pretorius paid for a luxury lifestyle”.

He said that because of outstanding fees and ethical considerations – certain “plan B versions” which were “lies” and would violate his ethical duties – he could not continue to represent the accused.

When the review application came before Judge Kruger yesterday, the applicants were not present and it was dismissed. Sentencing has been set down for October.