Did French fugitive from justice Jean-Claude Lacote have evidence implicating police National Commissioner Jackie Selebi and other police officials in crime?
Two related sources who had dealings with Lacote claim he had documents indicating a corrupt relationship between him and Selebi.
Lacote, wanted internationally for murder since before his 1999 arrival in South Africa (see sidebar), allegedly needed Selebi’s protection and intervention to smooth things for his reality TV series on the police, Duty Calls.
Earlier this month, Lacote escaped from Johannesburg’s Diepkloof Prison, where he was awaiting trial on multimillion-rand fraud charges.
Selebi, who did not reply to questions this week, denied any association with Lacote in a 2006 interview with the Mail & Guardian. He said that when Lacote entered South Africa in July 1999, he (Selebi) was still foreign affairs director general and only moved to the police at the end of that year. ‘The arrangements [for Duty Calls] were made here [in the SAPS] by those who were here,†Selebi said. ‘I don’t know Mr Lacote. I wasn’t here.â€
The circumstances of Lacote’s stay in South Africa and escape from prison have called some of Selebi’s assurances into question.
Lacote was arrested in February last year after Irish businessman Noel Hanley laid fraud charges relating to R10-million Lacote allegedly swindled from him.
About three weeks ago, Lacote walked out of Diepkloof Prison. According to prison authorities, he was booked out by people claiming to be police officers.
Prison documentation relating to the ‘police officers†has reportedly disappeared, complicating a joint investigation by police and Âprisons.
At this point, two other shadowy figures enter the picture. For legal reasons, the first can only be named as ‘CSâ€. He provided crucial information early in the Scorpions investigation of Selebi.
According to a version of the story provided to the M&G and reported by 702 Talk Radio, the ‘officers†who sprang Lacote gave ‘CS’s†telephone number as that of their commander.
This week ‘CS†denied any involvement in the Lacote escape.
The second figure is Lacote’s security adviser Willem Hall, who was himself arrested last year on a kidnapping charge.
On March 14 last year, The Star reported that during a search of Hall’s house after his arrest, police seized fake driving licences, bank cards and video footage belonging to Lacote.
In an interview attended by the M&G two days later, ‘CS†said he had visited Hall in prison. There Hall had told him that the items seized from the house included video footage of police assaulting victims, as well as documents showing a connection between Lacote and Selebi and that ‘he [Lacote] paid Selebi some moneyâ€.
In the same interview, ‘CS†also said Lacote had contacted him from prison, asking him to ensure that Hall did not ‘testify about Selebiâ€.
Hall had also told him that Lacote planned a jailbreak, sending him an SMS asking him to get his aircraft ready. Lacote did not realise that Hall had been arrested and that his SMS was intercepted by police.
Hall, who is out on bail in the kidnapping case, declined to comment. But the M&G has confirmed that ‘CS†accurately reflected Hall’s claims about the police seizure of incriminating items relating to Selebi after his arrest.
Among the unexplained circumstances of Lacote’s stay in South Africa are:
- Why was he allowed into the country when an Interpol red notice was picked up on his arrival in 1999? Reg Taylor, who heads the Interpol office in Pretoria, said: ‘We don’t just arrest, it depends on the circumstances — There are other procedures which also need to be followed.â€
- The M&G understands that following Hanley’s approach about Lacote’s alleged fraud, the South African High Commission in London wrote to a certain ‘Maxinâ€, a director of the police commercial crime branch in Johannesburg, on August 1 2003 asking for a case to be opened against Lacote. But a case was opened only in 2007, when Hanley travelled to South Africa to lay charges in person.
- Another security source told the M&G that the police intelligence division had been tracking Lacote, but got orders from above to desist.
- Belgian officials have been widely quoted as complaining about South Africa’s allegedly unhelpful and tardy response to its 1999 murder arrest warrant for Lacote and related extradition requests, and a 2006 extradition request on fraud charges.
However, Superintendent Milton Mendez, head of extradition at Interpol in Pretoria, said this week that when Lacote arrived in 1999 Interpol took action to apprehend him and asked Belgium to forward a formal extradition request. The authorities there did not comply with minimum conditions.
Mendez said the correct documents were received only in 2004. Delays and postponements meant the extradition hearing was delayed to June this year.
Murder rap? Have a job making police TV
An Interpol arrest warrant for murder and allegations of fraud failed to stop Jean-Claude Lacote from entering South Africa in July 1999. Nor did they handicap him in producing a reality TV show on the South African Police Service.
Lacote lived and worked in South Africa until he was arrested in February 2007 on charges dating back to 2000 of defrauding Irish businessman Noel Hanley.
Lacote said he was French-Canadian when he produced Duty Calls, an M-Net reality show based on remarkable access to police emergency response units. Reportedly the 41year-old is in fact a French citizen.
Lacote hit the European headlines in 1996 after the Mafia-style execution in Belgium of his British business partner, Marcus Mitchell. Mitchell’s body was found with two bullets in it and an unspent cartridge placed on his chest.
Lacote and his wife Hilde van Acker were arrested and held for four months on suspicion of involvement in the murder. They were then released for lack of evidence and promptly left Belgium for Brazil.
One newspaper report claimed that Lacote told the Belgian authorities he was an agent of the French intelligence services, which had confirmed his claim.
Belgian police continued the murder investigation and were apparently able to crack the couple’s alibi.
Efforts to extradite the pair from Brazil failed, but the attempt prompted Lacote to move to South Africa in July 1999. By that time he had already secured the agreement of police for the television series.
The Interpol murder warrant was noted on his arrival, but he was not extradited.
In 2000, using the alias Roger Wilcox, Lacote allegedly persuaded Hanley that he would lend the Irishman money to purchase four second-hand Fokker aircraft for the air-charter market.
Hanley was required to put up security of about €2-million to back Lacote’s loan.
Shortly after arriving in an Absa account for safekeeping the money was withdrawn using a signature copied from another document. Lacote allegedly used Hanley’s cash to purchase gold bullion and Ferraris.
In 2000 Belgian junior minister Pierre Chevalier resigned when it was suggested he might have profited from another bogus aircraft deal involving Lacote.
Chevalier, who had been Lacote’s lawyer during the murder investigation, was later cleared of wrongdoing.
Reports say that both Lacote and Van Acker have been convicted of fraud and money laundering in Belgium in their absence.
Earlier this year, Lacote was indicted in Belgium in absentia in the Mitchell murder case.