Sentence for R6m fraud slammed
Suspended jail term ‘too light for skelm’ who ate steak while victims ate chicken necks
CALLING the nine-year suspended sentence meted out to disgraced attorney Lionel Jacobs “too light for a skelm”, victims said yesterday they were struggling to put food on the table after being conned by the “smooth talker”.
Jacobs was convicted in October on 295 counts of fraud totalling more than R6-million and sentenced yesterday by magistrate Ronel Erasmus.
But he returned to Cape Town later after paying bail of R1 000.
He will report to a Cape Town police station weekly before he appears in the Joubertina Magistrate’s Court on July 11 to provide the court with his application for leave to appeal against his sentence.
Erasmus will be presiding over a case in the Langkloof town at that time.
Among Jacobs’s victims were a group of four women who have religiously attended the fraudster’s court appearances, which date back to 2008.
They said that the sentence was too light for “that skelm”.
Sydenham resident Sharon Tones, 54, told how the group of four women fell victim to Jacobs’s “smooth-talking ways” and said they would never recover financially from their losses.
“We have never received any money back and we are struggling because of it,” Tones said.
“This is the money so many people have worked their whole lives for. He [Jacobs] says he doesn’t have money but he took R1 000 out his back pocket to pay his bail.
“We don’t even have money for bread, then just to show his arrogance and smooth-talking ways, after court when I shouted at him about us having no money, he gave me R40 for bread.
“It is unjustifiable to only sentence him to nine years for a crime that will affect the rest of our lives.”
The 59-year-old Jacobs was initially accused alongside former employees John Billet and Dean Brophy, who were later acquitted of the charges. Billet has since died.
Jacobs started EP Consultants, which advertised services including facilitation, negotiation, arbitration and property and business brokering, but used this as a front to con people, predominantly pensioners, into making investments.
He then employed old friends Billet and Brophy, and when his scheme was finally exposed, tried to pin the blame on them.
More than 200 investors were persuaded to put up between R10 000 and R40 000 each.
In exchange, they were promised 5% monthly interest.
But in 2001, Jacobs informed investors that the payouts due had been frozen pending the outcome of an audit by the SA Revenue Service (SARS).
Further investigations revealed EP Consultants had never been registered with SARS.
The partners were sequestrated in 2001, and Billet and Brophy lost their houses and cars in the process.
The trial dragged on for seven years, mainly due to postponements requested by Jacobs.
Schauderville resident Virginia Blignaut, 58, also attended yesterday’s proceedings.
“He claims to have no money, yet we are the ones having to borrow from neighbours after he took all of our money,” Blignaut said.
“He was eating steaks while we have to survive on chicken necks and livers. This sentence doesn’t begin to pay back all the money he stole.
“We realised there was something wrong when we went to look for the money at his offices and the secretary gave us money from the petty cash.
“And you can be sure we will be in Joubertina to ensure this man pays for all he has put us through.”
Jacobs was struck off the roll of advocates in 2012.