Radovan Krejcir has been accused of many things, But he can’t be accused of not having a sense of humour, writes Shain Germaner.
Johannesburg - He has been sitting in the dock for 140 days. The novelty of the attempted murder trial has faded – his eyes don’t focus on the lawyers passionately giving their closing arguments, but on the iPad in front of him.
Digital beads snake across the screen, his hands frantically trying to slow them down. A small group of journalists covering the trial notice this and the next day before proceedings start, one of them asks what he has been playing.
He knows his answer is going to elicit a laugh. “It’s called Zuma*. I’m playing Zuma,” he says, a smirk on his face as the journalists burst into laughter.
Radovan Krejcir has been accused of many things. The police believe he’s Joburg’s underworld kingpin, responsible for organising the deaths of a series of associates – a top drug dealer, a supercar specialist and a strip-club magnate, to name just a few. He has been accused of dodgy business dealings to bring huge sums of money into the country that have allowed him to create his own criminal empire.
He has been accused of robbery and drug dealing. He has been accused of fraud.
But he certainly can’t be accused of not having a sense of humour.
Krejcir’s most current ongoing trial has focused on the attempted murder and kidnapping of a man whose brother allegedly stole a large shipment of drugs from the Czech millionaire. The state believes Krejcir and Sandton businessman Desai Luphondo recruited four police officers to help track down the thief, and when he couldn’t be caught, the man’s brother was seized and then tortured until he gave up his sibling’s location.
Last week, the State and defence teams closed their cases. When prosecutor Louis Mashiane was desperately trying to convince the court of the group’s guilt, Krejcir’s iPad was out. “I don’t want to hear that crap,” he tells journalists, explaining why he didn’t take notes during Mashiane’s tirade.
According to Krejcir, last Wednesday marked 20 months since his arrest, and he says it has been more than 140 days for him in court on this case alone.
“It’s the neverending story… This is my Rivonia Trial. It’s like Mandela!” he tells us, a broad smile on his face. It’s impossible not to snigger at the comparison to the former president, with Krejcir all too aware of the absurdity.
He also talks about a toothache that had been bothering him for months. He claimed he’d been requesting a dentist and had been forced to use a “s**tload” of painkillers to dull the pain. When they eventually took him to the dentist earlier this month, it took 10 minutes to fix the issue.
“They are clearly trying to torture me,” he says.
Maybe it’s his matter-of-fact way of speaking. Maybe it’s the thick accent. Maybe it’s an irrepressible sense of comic timing.
Almost two years in prison hasn’t seemed to dull Krejcir’s humour. Earlier this month, he was called to the stand at the Germiston Magistrate’s Court for a bail application that on its own couldn’t possibly set him free. At that court, he’s been charged with the murder of Sam Issa, a suspected drug dealer gunned down in Bedfordview allegedly because of a business relationship gone terribly wrong with Krejcir.
When Krejcir took the stand to tell the court how he was not a flight risk and would not interfere with witnesses, prosecutor Lawrence Gcaba looked incredulous.
The pair did their best to out-smug each other, from Gcaba’s semi-flirtatious smiles at Magistrate Sharlotte Sithole as he painted the Czech as a danger to society, to Krejcir’s own wooing of the court gallery.
It was noted that Krejcir had been convicted on three charges in the Czech Republic, and it eventually emerged there were at least five cases pending, which Krejcir freely admitted. When asked by Gcaba why he was admitting to this, Krejcir responded: “It’s better than six, right?”
Krejcir’s humour – and arrogance – has been rather apparent in a number of previous interviews in the media.
In an assassination plot that uncreative media outlets described as “something out of a movie”, Krejcir was wisecracking just hours after the attempt on his life.
In July 2013, Krejcir had been walking on the premises of his business, Moneypoint, when a weaponised VW Polo parked in the lot opened fire on him, the bullets narrowly missing him. Upon further investigation, police found a dozen gun barrels hidden behind the vehicle’s licence plate, a device that could seemingly be operated remotely, as no one was found inside the car.
“I’m a lucky man,” he told reporters at the scene. “All my life is like James Bond stuff. So it’s usual stuff for me… It’s how I live my life.”
When asked who was responsible for the assassination plot, he answered: “Even if I have some idea, I’m not going to tell you.”
In a robbery case that has since been dropped, Krejcir was accused in 2011 of robbing an electronics store in Pretoria. At one of his court appearances, he was flippant about the relatively tiny amount stolen from the store. “Me, as a billionaire, do I need to go on a Sunday morning with my flip-flops, shorts and T-shirt to rob people of R20 000?”
The case was eventually dropped against Krejcir, but in recent years, police have learnt that just one case is clearly not enough.
With his experienced legal team and plenty of bail money available, one case at a time would not be enough to keep him behind bars, which is presumably why he has now got three active trials against him.
The attempted murder trial is set down for August 24, a possible judgment date.
Krejcir is convinced he’s going to be found innocent; he believes the State’s case, like many of the others that have fallen away, is just too weak.
“I’m going to win,” he said last week, as he glanced over to the one member of his family who still comes to the court proceedings, Marlene Nezar, his son’s girlfriend. It’s not because his family has abandoned him; his son Denis, 20, and wife, Katerina, have been denied access to South Africa since a holiday in the Czech Republic in December.
Denis was declared a prohibited person by the Department of Home Affairs, meaning he and his mother must stay in the Czech Republic as they fight to return to South Africa. Whether this legal battle will continue remains in dispute, though, as prosecutors in the Issa murder case have said they believe Denis was involved in the murder so that if he returns to South Africa, he will be charged.
But Krejcir says they will fight. It’s unclear whether Krejcir is saying this to comfort Nezar, who lives in South Africa, and according to media reports has been in a relationship with Denis for several years.
Krejcir is delicate with her. When she came over to him as he sat in the dock last week, he spoke softly, reassuringly. The fatherly smiles are a softer side we rarely see, but that’s also evident when he speaks of how he misses his family.
Before becoming too emotional, Krejcir changes the subject. Suddenly the journalists in the court gallery are hearing about the Seychelles, the country he fled before coming to South Africa. He says it’s an amazing holiday spot, but he would never want to live there again. “On Monday, you go fishing. On Tuesday, you go snorkelling. On Wednesday, diving. On Thursday… uh, fishing again,” he jokes.
When he’s playing travel agent, it’s easy to forget the charges against him. Torture, murder, drug dealing, kidnapping. If even a fraction of the cases against him have any basis in reality, Krejcir is a dangerous, calculating individual.
* Zuma is a bead-based puzzle game that has no relation to President Jacob Zuma.
The Star