The three men accused of murdering Bronx nightclub owner Bruno Bronn are set to go on trial after several postponements.
|||Cape Town -
The three men accused of murdering Bronx nightclub owner Bruno Bronn are to go on trial before Western Cape High Court Judge President John Hlophe on Wednesday.
The trial arising from Bronn’s February 2012 murder was to have begun on Monday, but could not as a lawyer for one of the accused, Fareez Allie, was caught up in another matter.
Allie, Johan Coetzer and Achmat Toffa have been charged with murder and aggravated robbery.
Bronn was found dead in his Green Point home. He had been strangled.
The matter has been postponed several times for various reasons, among them that Toffa changed lawyers three times.
First, he could no longer afford a private lawyer, then a Legal Aid lawyer withdrew for health reasons. The third lawyer withdrew without giving reasons in open court.
“It’s high time that this matter gets under way,” Judge Hlophe said during the men’s last court appearance in October.
On Monday, prosecutor Carine Teunissen said the case could not go ahead and asked that the case begin on Wednesday.
Coetzer is out on bail of R20 000 and Allie on R5 000.
Toffa’s bail of R15 000 was withdrawn because he failed to adhere to almost all of his bail conditions, which included reporting to the police daily and remaining under house arrest.
He is being held at Pollsmoor Prison.
A fourth man, Kurt Erispe, who was initially charged alongside the trio, has turned State witness.
jade.otto@inl.co.za
Cape Argus