'Petrol bomb attackers’ beef up legal team

When some of the accused were arraigned in court, they were all represented by attorney Dimpho Masunda. But when they appeared before Senior Magistrate Game Mooketsi this week, attorney Kagiso Jani represented the first accused, Kabelo Mompati, while counsel Mishingo Jeremia represented the fifth accused person, Unoziba Buka. Masunda now represents all the remaining accused persons. At issue was the urgent application by Jani for the accused persons to be granted bail.

Koziba Nthanga from the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) called the investigations officer (IO) Thatayaone Sankoloba to give reasons why the accused should be denied bail. Nthanga had initially told the court that the prosecution was indifferent to the accused being granted bail. Sankoloba told the court that some of the objects that he recovered from the scene of crime that were allegedly used by the accused to commit the offences have been taken to the forensic laboratory for analysis and as such he was still awaiting a report about the objects. He went on: “...The accused are not related and do not reside in the same compound.