Police search lawyers before Cape Town extortion hearing

Lawyers representing five men accused of extortion were furious about being searched by police as they entered Cape Town Magistrate’s Court on Thursday.

Expletives were uttered as the lawyers for Nafiz Modack‚ Colin Booysen‚ Ashley Fields‚ Jacques Cronje and Carl Lakay were searched before their bail hearing could resume.

Journalists covering the bail hearing were also searched‚ as well as being prevented from taking their usual seats and ordered to turn off their cellphones.

State prosecutor Adiel Jansen asking for a postponement in the fourth week of what has become a marathon bail hearing. This was apparently because the investigating officer in the case‚ Colonel Charl Kinnear‚ is ill.

The emergence of a photograph of President Jacob Zuma’s son with suspected underworld boss Modack has added extra spice to the hearing. The photograph of Duduzane Zuma and Nafiz Modack was taken at a Cape Town hotel in October‚ News24 reported on Wednesday. It shows the two men sitting at a table and smiling.

The five accused were arrested on an extortion charge on December 15 and the bail hearing is the prelude to what is expected to become South Africa's biggest organised crime trial.

Kinnear has testified that Modack’s gang has connections to senior politicians‚ including members of the Zuma family. He has also named at least four high-ranking police officers who he alleged to be under Modack’s “influence”.

The state is trying to prevent the men from getting bail because it fears they will interfere with witnesses and are a “threat to society”.