Isseri wheeled in for bail bid

Murder accused Sateesh Isseri, 53, arrived at court in an ambulance and was wheeled in on a stretcher surrounded by paramedics. He has been charged with murder after the disappearance of his former girlfriend eight years ago. Picture: Tania Broughton

Murder accused Sateesh Isseri, 53, arrived at court in an ambulance and was wheeled in on a stretcher surrounded by paramedics. He has been charged with murder after the disappearance of his former girlfriend eight years ago. Picture: Tania Broughton

Published Nov 26, 2015

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Durban - Businessman Sateesh Isseri, charged with the murder of his ex-girlfriend who vanished without a trace eight years ago, arrived at court on a stretcher, surrounded by paramedics, for his bail application on Wednesday.

Attached to a monitor which occasionally emitted “pings”, he lay under a hospital blanket with his eyes closed while his attorney, Anand Nepaul, submitted a thick wad of recent medical reports to Durban Regional Court magistrate Zinhle Mnguni.

These showed that he was still a patient at Ethekwini Hospital, had had a stroke, had recently had a stent put into his heart and needed a hernia operation.

“The reports are objective … they cannot be feigned,” Nepaul said. “It is clear he is seriously ill.”

Isseri - who was released on bail of R50 0000 on Wednesday - has been charged with the murder of Faieka Esop Ali who has not been seen since February 2007 when, it is alleged, she left with Isseri to go to a clinic.

The State alleges that while the pair had been dating, Ali had wanted to break up with him.

Ali’s family first made the allegation against Isseri in a Durban High Court application in which they sought an order presuming that she was dead.

Over the years several investigating officers have handled the case and Isseri has been interviewed many times.

This was one of the facts put forward by Nepaul in his argument for bail, suggesting that this proved that Isseri would stand trial and had always co-operated.

“In fact he wants this over. He wants to prove his innocence once and for all,” he said, detailing a “basket of reasons” why he should get bail.

Isseri, who owns Circle Health Care Centre and has been married to Elizabeth Chetty for 27 years, said in an affidavit before the court that over the years he had pointed the police to other possible witnesses, engaged a private investigator and even put an advert in a Sunday newspaper calling for information.

In response to the advert, one Ebrahim Dayal said he had done business with Ali after the date she had supposedly gone missing.

Dayal had provided his former attorney with original invoice books detailing these transactions, which were still available.

Regarding his arrest, he said it was completely unnecessary, and “a simple phone call or SMS” would have sufficed to ensure his attendance at court.

State advocate Dorian Paver said he was still opposed to bail but would “leave it in the hands of court”.

Magistrate Mnguni ruled that while Isseri had to show that it was in the interests of justice for him to be released from custody, he had proved several exceptional circumstances, including his ill health, his ties to the community, the fact that the alleged crime happened so long ago and that he had always co-operated with the investigation.

Isseri will appear in court again in January.

The Mercury

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