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State needs more time to prepare for Ntuthuko Shoba’s third bail application

Iavan Pijoos Journalist
Ntuthuko Shoba has a new legal team and hopes to bring a third application to be released on bail. File photo.
Ntuthuko Shoba has a new legal team and hopes to bring a third application to be released on bail. File photo.
Image: Alaister Russel/Sunday Times

The state needs more time to prepare for the third bail application of former JSE analyst Ntuthuko Shoba, on trial in the South Gauteng High Court for the murder of his pregnant girlfriend Tshegofatso Pule. 

Shoba's defence attorneys had failed to meet the deadline to submit their heads of arguments, state prosecutor Faghre Mohamed said during a virtual hearing on Tuesday.

The deadline for heads of argument submissions was at noon on Friday but Shoba’s defence submitted them on Monday afternoon.

Shoba’s advocate Zweli Zakwe said he was only briefed to prepare heads of arguments on Saturday afternoon.

“For the whole day on Sunday I prepared the heads [of argument] and forwarded it in the early hours to my instructing attorney who subsequently filed them.”

Zakwe said he was informed by the instructing attorney that the previous counsel had “personal problems” and as a result failed to meet the submission deadline.

Mohamed asked the court to postpone the matter until Thursday for him to prepare  heads of arguments and “do the necessary research”.

Shoba has brought two failed bail applications so far, and alleges that the man already serving a 20-year prison term for Pule's murder, Muzikayise Malephane, is sending him threatening messages.

Shoba's second bail application was denied by the Roodepoort magistrate’s court on May 7. At the time magistrate Delize Smith said most of the evidence offered was not entirely “new facts” and had been heard during his previous bail application.

Pule was eight months pregnant when she was found murdered, hanging from a tree, in June last year. The prosecution has led evidence that her unborn child was Shoba's.

TimesLIVE

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