Alleged underworld boss Nafiz Modack appeared in the Cape Town magistrate’s court on Friday along with murder-accused Zane Killian after they were charged with two others for the attempted murder of Cape Town lawyer William Booth.
Modack, Killian, Ricardo Morgan and Modack’s righthand man Jacques Cronje appeared in the dock on a raft of charges relating to their alleged involvement in conspiring to kill Booth. Killian is also standing trial separately in connection with the murder of anti-gang unit detective Lt-Col Charl Kinnear in September.
The conspiracy is allegedly in relation to an illicit debt collection by Modack and Cronje on behalf of a third party who alleged that forex investor Sameer Vallie owed him R600,000.
The state alleged that during the debt collection on March 9 last year, Modack and Cronje kidnapped and kept Vallie in a boardroom at Crystal Towers in Cape Town’s Century City until he signed an admission of debt form for R600,000 owed to the third party. The state alleges they then forced him to electronically transfer R90,000 into Killian’s account. He was then deprived of his freedom of movement and taken to his Claremont home, where he was forced to make the transaction.
The group, including Morgan, face additional charges of intimidation, money laundering, and charges of contravention of the Electronic Communications Act for intercepting Vallie’s cellphone data, allegedly pinging his cellphone to reveal his location, on three occasions from March 11.
Booth, it is understood, represented Vallie to get a protection order against Cronje relating to the incident at the Wynberg magistrate’s court in Cape Town last year. He also assisted Vallie in opening cases against the accused relating to the alleged extortion shortly after the incident last year.
Modack faces conspiracy to commit murder charges for allegedly plotting with a gang from Woodstock to kill Booth at his Oranjezicht home between March 9 and April 9 2020.
The state alleged that between March 6 2020 and September 18, Modack had pinged Booth’s phone 658 times.
On April 9 last year, three hitmen made a farcical attempt at shooting Booth at his Oranjezicht home.
The Terrible West Siders gang hitmen Ebrahim Deare and Riyaad Gesant lived up to the gang's name when they foiled their own attempts at murdering Booth on two occasions on April 7 and 8, first going to the wrong address and selecting to abandon the hit in the confusion.
On the second attempt, Deare, the gunman selected for the hit by Terrible West Siders de facto boss Kauthar Brown, smoked mandrax (methaqualone) and got so high he fell into a hole, inducing a leg injury for which he had to be taken to hospital.
The Terrible West Siders gang hitmen, Ebrahim Deare and Riyaad Gesant, lived up to the gang's name when they foiled their own attempts at murdering lawyer William Booth on two occasions.
On April 9 2020, the imprisoned Terrible West Siders’ gang boss – not named in court documents – who commissioned the hit, ordered that the mission be completed immediately. The hitmen then went to Booth’s home and fired five shots at him from a revolver loaded with six rounds while Booth was standing next to his garage.
Brown and the the two hitmen entered into plea and sentencing agreements with the state, and were sentenced last week.
Modack is also expected to appear in the Bishop Lavis magistrate’s court on Monday along with Anti-Gang Unit Sergeant Ashley Tabisher on corruption and money laundering charges relating to an elaborate alleged plot to kill Anti-Gang Unit section commander Col Kinnear.
Modack is also facing five conspiracy to commit murder charges relating to the incident that played out near Kinnear’s home over several days in November 2019 and which culminated in two suspects being arrested allegedly in possession of a hand grenade near the Kinnear family home.
He also faces attempted murder charges relating to the incident that involved, as the state alleges, a plot to lob a grenade at the house with the intention to kill Kinnear, his family and two police officers guarding the home.
However, one of the accused in the case, Amaal Jantjies, said during her bail bid that the incident was part of an elaborate trap operation set up by the Anti-Gang Unit to try to catch Modack.
Jantjies and her lover Janick Adonis were helping the AGU in the lead-up to the plot during October 2019, allegedly in exchange for the unit’s help to secure either bail, or a mitigated prison sentence for Adonis, who was on trial in Khayelitsha on attempted murder charges at the time.
The state says Jantjies and Adonis had several meetings with AGU commander Lt-Gen André Lincoln and members of the AGU, including Tabisher and at least two other police officers, alleged by the state to have been corrupted by Jantjies on behalf of Modack, at the Anti-Gang Unit’s Faure base.
Last week in the Parow magistrate’s court, during cross-examination of Jantjies’ testimony, it emerged that the plot to lure Modack into orchestrating an attack on Kinnear to trap him was discussed, but that the plan was abandoned after it was deemed too risky by the director of public protections.
The state alleged that when the accused realised they could not hedge their position to entrap Modack in exchange for the Anti-Gang Unit’s help in freeing Adonis, they took the plan to Modack, which saw a series of real attempts at murdering Kinnear, culminating in the alleged grenade attack.
The cases related to Booth’s attempted murder and extortion were postponed until March 14 for the case to be transferred to the Blue Downs Regional Court, where charges will be consolidated and for a possible bail bid.
