/ 15 March 2008

Ex-bouncer guilty of murder

Former bouncer Jonathan Street was convicted of murder and attempted murder by the Johannesburg High Court on Friday. He is to be sentenced on March 26.

Judge Nico Coetzee found that Street shot and killed Kyle Norris (18) in the Max-X club in Edenvale on the East Rand on November 19 2006.

Street told the court earlier in his trial that he had gone to the Max-X club with his brother and friends. He said he paid to have sex with a woman at the club and left. When his brother and friends did not join him, he went to look for them.

He told the court that as he went back inside the club, he found his brother and friends being attacked by a group of men. He testified that he had to shoot Norris in self-defence, but that he had ”no intention of killing anyone”.

Street was also found guilty of charges relating to an incident before the murder. He was convicted on charges of assault to cause grievous bodily harm and of discharging a firearm in public during an altercation with bouncers at a Bedfordview restaurant earlier that night.

Street was refused entry to the restaurant because he was not wearing appropriate attire. Despite this, he entered but was pushed back by a bouncer.

Street told the court that he pushed the bouncer because the man ”pushed him first”. He then punched one of the other bouncers in the neck and told his friends they had to leave.

When they left the restaurant, Street fired two shots, which he argued he did to warn off the bouncers. ”I was trying to prevent a fight,” he said during his testimony. — Sapa