Cape Town - Flippie Engelbrecht’s self-styled spokeswoman has revealed that the amputee and his family had been subjected to “countless” death threats since charges were laid against a wine estate owner and manager.
She was speaking on Thursday, less than 24 hours before the manager, Wilhelm Treurnicht, the remaining accused in the case of assault against Engelbrecht, 20, was due to appear in the Ashton Magistrate’s Court. The owner of the wine estate on which Engelbrecht was allegedly assaulted, Johnny Burger, killed himself last week.
Freedom Trust secretary Carina Papenfus, the struck-off lawyer who is championing Engelbrecht’s cause, said death threats had been sent by email, called in over the phone and posted to her home in Hermanus.
“It’s terrible, it’s rude and it’s filthy,” she said, citing one that threatened to give her Aids.
“There are others that are just deliberate attempts to incite people to kill me or Flippie and his family.”
She said the threats had become a common part of her life since the case began. “It always escalates right before a court appearance. It’s clearly an orchestrated attempt to try and intimidate us.”
But police spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Andrè Traut said the police had no records of threats directed at Papenfus or the Engelbrechts.
Meanwhile, Burger’s family, who had kept silent since the 62-year-old’s death, have finally spoken.
The farmer, who is charged with assaulting Engelbrecht in 2008, shot and killed himself at his family home on the Rietvallei Wine Estate in Robertson last week.
His son Kobus, now managing the estate, told the Cape Argus that the family needed some space.
“At this point I’m focusing on my family,” he said, responding to questions about the court case.
Burger’s death means that “Dozi” Treurnicht will have to face court proceedings alone. During the previous appearance, just a day or two before Burger’s suicide, police used a stun grenade to disperse angry protesters outside the court building.
It is the State’s case that in 2008, Burger and Treurnicht beat Engelbrecht, who was 15 at the time. The Freedom Trust claims the beating left Engelbrecht blind and subject to epileptic seizures.
Later, during a fit, he fell into a fire and lost both his hands.
Papenfus said the case was likely to be postponed again on Friday. But she said three more farmworkers, who claimed they had also been assaulted by Treurnicht, would be outside the court to share their stories on Friday.
Police confirmed they are investigating another three assault accusations lodged against the farm manager.
“(There are) two charges of assault and one of sexual assault. We will, however, not elaborate on the investigation at this stage.”
Papenfus claimed “many” other farmworkers had come forward after Burger’s death and Treurnicht could be facing “a mountain of cases” in the future.
But as the main battle unfolds in the courtroom, another one is escalating on the Internet. Papenfus is being scrutinised online for her persistent and “obtrusive” social media campaign against Burger and Treurnicht.
This week saw the setting up of an anti-Papenfus website, Carina de Vries Papenfus Uncut, and a parody Twitter account. The website links users to the page for her husband’s property company, which counts Papenfus as one of its employees.
A large part of the criticism was incited by Papenfus’s attempts to get the wine industry to blacklist Rietvallei Wine Estate’s products.
Wines of South Africa spokesman Andre Morgenthal confirmed that the group, among others, had received an email in July calling for a boycott of the estate’s wines.
The email claimed that the farm’s current manager, Kobus Burger, had witnessed the assault on Engelbrecht and had done nothing about it.
But Morgenthal said he would reserve comment on the issue until the case had been completed.
According to farmers in the area, some retailers had already taken the wines, which include the John B range, off their shelves.
Claims that Engelbrecht had suffered from epilepsy at least two years before he was allegedly assaulted have added fuel to the fire.
On Monday, the Cape Argus reported that a former neighbour of the Engelbrecht family had witnessed Engelbrecht having seizures in 2006.
This, and other apparent inconsistencies - such as those reportedly found in some of Engelbrecht’s medical records - have led people to question Papenfus’s motives and background.
But the former lawyer said she had nothing to hide, tackling head-on reports that she had been admitted to the Lentegeur Psychiatric Hospital in 2008. “I had a nervous breakdown and yes, I went to the neural clinic there,” she said. “I’m bipolar and have obsessive compulsive disorder.”
She said that after receiving treatment she left the clinic in December that year. Neither condition affected her ability to work and to represent Engelbrecht’s best interests, she said.
“I believe in Flippie and this is why I’m doing this.”
Meanwhile, she said, Engelbrecht’s seizures had become more frequent.
“We have been instructed by his medical team to shield him from the outside world for at least the next two weeks in an attempt to stabilise him.
“We have been warned that his seizures might be fatal.”
She said he was not set to appear in court on Friday.
Cape Argus