High-profile cases going through the courts

E-Brief News reports that there was a significant development in one the strangest criminal cases in recent SA history. Former IT specialist Funi Madlala was sentenced to three months\' imprisonment, suspended for three years, after co-operating with the Inspector-General in the hoax e-mail saga that sent shock waves through the government. Others still facing criminal charges following the controversial espionage operation are former Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) Billy Masetlha and businessman Muzi Kunene. According to a report on the News 24 site, Madlala co-operated with the Inspector-General of Intelligence in the matter and was given three months behind bars, suspended for three years. Madlala, who spent 11 years at the NIA, was arrested over his involvement in the \'manufacturing\' of hoax e-mails purported to have been written by senior ANC members. These discredited party Deputy President Jacob Zuma and Secretary-General Kgalema Motlanthe. The Pretoria News reports that Madlala agreed that he contravened the Oversight Act by not supplying Ngcakani with information and refusing to answer questions, even though he initially agreed that he had information in his possession. The plea-bargain document read: \'The accused attended an interview on October 24 2005 and indicated that he was in possession of information that he would provide at a later date. However, he failed to provide such information, which resulted in him being charged on November 9 2005 for contravening certain provision of the Oversight Act. Subsequent to him being charged the accused agreed to attend interviews with the IGI and ... to provide the IGI with information the IGI deemed necessary for the performance of his functions.\' Madlala told the court that as a result of his dismissal at the NIA, \'he could not obtain further employment and suffers financially\'. Full report on the News24 site Full Pretoria News report

In another high profile case, a Cape Town Court heard that there\'s no evidence against alleged sex blogger Juan-Duval Uys. Magistrate Phindi Norman said she was \'confused and astounded\' by the State\'s decision to refer the case back to the Director of Public Prosecutions, to decide if the prosecution of Uys is to continue. Uys, who\'s referred to in the corridors of the court as \'the Scarlet Pimpernel of Cyberspace\', appeared again on charges of fraud and crimen injuria. Die Burger reports that the charge of crimen injuria filed against Uys by Simon Grindrod of the ID relates to an Internet sex blog by a male prostitute, in which prominent SA men were named. \'I wondered what was going through the Public Prosecutor\'s mind,\' Norman said of the decision of a previous prosecutor to go ahead with charges against Uys, bearing in mind the content of the court affidavit. The magistrate postponed the case for the last time and gave the State until September 21 to decide what would become of it. Uys\' attorney Reaz Khan put it to the court that he and a senior prosecutor had examined the contents of the dossier and agreed that it contained nothing that could connect Uys with the charges against him. Khan said he had met the prosecutor on Monday morning specifically to see if there was a case against Uys. \'Everything is based on the suspicions of the complainant and on media reports,\' Khan told the court. Full report in Die Burger

Elsewhere, a Chinese cyber-dissident has been sentenced to four years in jail after he was convicted of \'inciting the government\'s overthrow.\' According to a MSNBC report, Chen Shuqing, an outspoken critic of the Chinese Government and advocate of democratic reforms, was arrested last year on charges of inciting subversion against the state, a vaguely worded charge authorities often use against activists they deem threatening to the ruling Communist Party. Chen, who is a founding member of the banned China Democracy Party, was arrested last September in the eastern Zhejiang province. Police searched his home and seized his computer\'s disk drives. Full MSNBC report

In a bid to pressure the Egyptian Government to enhance freedom of expression and religion, US Congressmen Trent Franks and Emanuel Cleaver issued an open letter to President Hosni Mubarak urging him to release imprisoned Alexandrian student blogger Kareem Amer. The Daily Star notes that a former student at Al-Azhar University, 22-year-old Amer was sentenced in January to four years in prison for insulting Islam and President Mubarak on his Internet blog. The case marks the first time Egypt sentences a blogger for ‘tarnishing’ online writings. Full Daily Star report