Durban -
Durban North chartered accountant Antony Marais had his offer to repay almost R900 000 to two clients he defrauded refused by the Commercial Crimes Court on Monday because the first payment of R150 000 would have come from his mother.
Magistrate Melvin Govender disregarded the offer from Marais’s attorney Satch Morgan, saying that his mother should not have to pay for his wrongdoing.
Marais, who was found guilty of two counts of fraud earlier this year, was sentenced to five years imprisonment with the option of correctional supervision after he served 10 months of his sentence.
However, Morgan applied for leave to appeal against his client’s conviction, based on the fact that the evidence of the first complainant, Arthur Pimenta, 88, was hearsay as he was in a nursing home and too frail to testify.
Pimenta lost R225 000 while a second victim was defrauded of R670 000.
Earlier in the proceedings Marais’s parole officer, Makhosazana Montantana, said Marais’s victims had refused his offer because previous promises of repayment were not honoured.
Had they accepted compensation she would have recommended a sentence without direct imprisonment.
In making her recommendations, she said: “I took into consideration that the accused was in a position of trust. They relied on him and he betrayed that trust. Pimenta is an elderly, vulnerable man who relied on him with his pension money, yet he was defrauded.”
Although also taking into consideration that Marais was a first-time offender, that his crime was of a non-violent nature, and that he had three children to support, Montantana said his crimes were serious enough to warrant imprisonment and that a sentence without it would not serve as a strong deterrent.
However, in mitigation of sentence, Morgan said Marais remained willing to repay his victims, and that this offer should be accepted and a sentence without imprisonment imposed.
He argued that if Marais was imprisoned it would affect his children as they would have to move schools due to their mother not being able to raise them in their current standards without a salary from him.
Morgan said that Marais would repay his victims in the following manner:
- An immediate payment of R150 000.
- 59 monthly payments of R10 000 a month.
- A final payment of R154 236 on the 60th month.
But when questioned as to where Marais would get his first, immediate payment of R150 000, Morgan said it was coming from his mother.
In sentencing, however, Govender said this was “alarming” and unacceptable.
Marais was immediately taken into custody. His family were unwilling to comment after the sentencing.
The Mercury