Hewitt off to jail

THE Pretoria High Court reserved judgment in the application by President Jacob Zuma and the National Prosecuting Authority for leave to appeal in the seven-year spy tape case.

This follows the ruling that Zuma should face 783 charges of corruption with the decision to drop charges labelled “irrational”. FORMER tennis star and convicted rapist Bob Hewitt will start his six-year prison sentence, after the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein dismissed his appeal on Thursday.

The 76-year-old former doubles Grand Slam winning champion was found guilty on two counts of rape and one of sexual assault in March last year, after abusing three women while he was their tennis coach in the 1980s and 1990s. The women were minors at the time. In 2015 Judge Bert Bam convicted Hewitt in a judgment that labelled him a “violator of children”.

Court reserves judgment on Zuma spy tapes

In 2009 then NPA head Mokotedi Mpshe said transcripts of telephone conversations between then Scorpions boss Leonard McCarthy and former NPA boss Bulelani Ngcuka showed political interference in the decision to charge Zuma.

The charges were withdrawn in 2009.