Plea bargaining up for review

THE National Prosecuting Authority has buckled under pressure in Parliament and admitted it would review the plea bargaining system, which in some cases has resulted in fraudsters getting light sentences.

The prosecuting authority was slated by the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) for entering into plea bargains with criminals in corruption cases involving hundreds of millions of rand.

Scopa members yesterday said the NPA allowed people convicted of fraud and corruption to walk away with lenient sentences.

The NPA was part of the government Anti-Corruption Task Team, which also includes the Hawks and various agencies, briefing Scopa on corruption cases under investigation.

This followed a presentation by the NPA to Scopa on corruption cases amounting to more than R1 billion it has investigated and prosecuted.

It said that of the 42 cases it had investigated, 41 resulted in plea bargains.

The Deputy National Director of Public Prosecutions, Nomvula Mokhatla, said that in some of the cases there had also been guilty pleas.

Convictions

This meant the matters did not go to trial, but the convictions and sentences of the criminals were agreed by both sides and confirmed by the courts. Mokhatla said NPA head Shaun Abrahams had also looked at the plea bargaining issue.

“The NPA is going back to do a review of all these cases.

“It is alarming to see the number of these cases that were finalised through plea bargaining,” she said.

However, Mokhatla stressed that plea bargaining did not let people completely off the hook, and that the evidence in the case was presented in court. Scopa chairman Themba Godi said the NPA would have to rethink the plea bargain system because it let criminals get off scot free.

“It looks like your courts are your olden-day Catholic churches, where you go and confess your sins and you go to heaven,” said Godi.

“It cannot be allowed that all the cases were finalised through plea bargaining.”

Ntombovuyo Mente of the EFF said that millions of rand had been stolen by criminals, and the Anti-Corruption Task Team must do a proper job and stop plea bargaining.

She said in one case, R20 million had been stolen from a municipality by a criminal who hacked the municipality’s computer system.

Mente said plea bargains allowed criminals to decide how much punishment they should receive for their crimes.

ANC MP Nyami Booi said the issue should be dealt with now, before it became too difficult.