Self-confessed racist and societal delinquent Angelo Agrizzi, who is supposedly saddled with a R3.3-million medical bill, allegedly trained for three months to be able to walk his daughter down the aisle.
This emerged on Friday at the Johannesburg specialised commercial crimes court, sitting in Palmridge, where Agrizzi’s lawyer, advocate Mannie Witz, said his client’s repeated absence from the case was due to a raft of “critical and chronic [health] conditions”.
Agrizzi, who is facing fraud and corruption charges alongside former ANC MP Vincent Smith, failed to appear in court in March and again on Friday, despite being well enough to attend his daughter’s wedding in early May, as well as walking her down the aisle.
But Witz, who spoke to the Mail & Guardian after the matter had concluded, said his client was not well and doctors had advised that Agrizzi should isolate because of a raft of ailments he suffered from, including hypertension, gout, diabetes and early renal failure.
Witz added that Agrizzi was permanently reliant on metres-long tubes attached to oxygen tanks for his breathing.
“He [Agrizzi] trained two-to-three months to walk [a few metres] down the aisle with no oxygen support. As he got to the altar, the portable oxygen [tank] was waiting for him,” Witz said.
Smith, his company Euroblitz 48 and Agrizzi face five corruption and fraud charges for an R800 000 payment Agrizzi allegedly made to Euroblitz 48 on behalf of Smith. This was during the time when Agrizzi was the chief operations officer of the notorious Bosasa company, which has been at the centre of state capture allegations.
Smith is the former chairperson of the parliamentary portfolio committee of correctional services, the department in which a more than R838-million catering contract was given to Bosasa.
Both accused, as well as Smith on behalf of his company, have indicated that they would plead not guilty to all charges.
On why he mentioned Agrizzi’s training regiment ahead of his daughter’s wedding, Witz asserted: “I preempted [what the prosecution] was going to say; ‘Oh, but he was good enough to go to his daughter’s wedding.’”
State advocate Arno Rossouw said that, at the next appearance in July, the National Prosecuting Authority would have studied Agrizzi’s medical report and taken the decision on whether or not to separate the accused, “in order to give [Smith] his right to a fair and speedy trial”.
The matter was postponed to July back to the same court. Both accused are out on bail.