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| Jackie Selebi |
The key suspect is a Cuban exile, Nelson Yester-Garrido, who fled to South Africa in 1997 from the United States. He was wanted for attempting to buy a Soviet-era submarine to smuggle industrial quantities of cocaine into America.
The story had all the elements of a spy-thriller, complete with fast cars, expensive properties a racy life-style and plenty of dead bodies. The only difference is that it was not fiction. The United States attempted to have Yester-Garrido extradited.
“[Yester-Garrido] and this group were negotiating for the purchase of a Russian diesel submarine for Columbian drug suppliers, who intended to use it to transport cocaine to the west coast of the US and Canada,” one affidavit said. That attempt was foiled, and with the American police on his trail, Yester-Garrido fled to South Africa.
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| Glen Agliotti |
There he is alleged to have continued his drugs dealing, leading to his arrest in August 2010. Chris Els, of the South African Police, told the New Statesman that the investigation is continuing, since those involved are still plying their trade. “They won’t stop,” he said. Brazilian authorities are holding eight suspects in an operation that was co-ordinated with the South African authorities. “The Brazilian end is still being sorted out,” said Warrant-Officer Els.
The South African arrests took place in a raid during which 166 kilos of cocaine were seized at the port of Ngqura, near Port Elizabeth. The drugs were found hidden in the metal pillars of a container transporting used cooking oil.
According to Officer Els, the container only one of a number being used by the smugglers, some of which had slipped past the authorities. “A further three to four containers are still outstanding,” he said.
The British link was revealed in what was probably the most high-profile conviction since the end of apartheid. South Africa’s most senior law enforcement officer, Jackie Selebi, the National Police Commissioner was convicted of corruption and sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment in 2010.
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| Nelson Yester-Garrido |
Selebi had been a trusted associate of President Thabo Mbeki. He became the first African to hold the post of president of Interpol, amid much publicity. Selebi was found guilty of accepting cash in brown paper bags from a known drugs trafficker, Glen Agliotti. Selebi and Agliotti used to meet almost daily at the Brazilian coffee shop in Sandton, a plush Johannesburg suburb. Among those sharing their table was Yester-Garrido.
In Johannesburg, Yester-Garrido became close to Wingate-Pearse, an importer and exporter in the clothing trade, and to his business partner, Mazzotti, who rose in the rag trade from street hawker to “brand consultant”. These men, in turn, were close to Agliotti, several sources who knew them said, and company records confirm.
Café Society
The association between the men was most visible in their regular lunches at the Sandton City branch of the Brazilian, where, said one person who knew them at the time, they “lorded it” over the coffee bar. Though Yester-Garrido denied through a lawyer even knowing Agliotti, one source specifically remembered both of them joining in the lunches.
From those lunches sprang at least three business enterprises: the close corporation Tradefirst 1095, which sources sympathetic to the men claim was a vehicle to invest in an IT business, and partnerships in two Sandton City clothing boutiques, Fubu Collection and DKNY.
In Tradefirst, Agliotti, Mazzotti and Wingate-Pearse were among seven partners.
The partners in Fubu included Mazzotti, Wingate-Pearse and their wives—sisters Analisa Mazzotti and Donatella Wingate-Pearse—as well as Agliotti’s former wife, Vivien, with whom he has remained close.
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Adriano Mazzotti |
Was there more than lunch and designer brands between the rag-traders, Agliotti and Yester-Garrido?
Two sources who knew the coffee-club group have claimed their activities were far from innocent. One said simply: “They did [trafficked] drugs.”
Another claimed detailed knowledge of how clothing imports were used for illegal business. The source described how bales of imported second-hand clothing were brought to a bonded warehouse—a government-licensed facility where in-transit wares are stored pending re-export—where Yester-Garrido would identify certain bales to be removed illegally.
These, the source claimed, contained concealed drugs, though he had not seen them himself. Wingate-Pearse and Mazzotti reject these claims. The source claimed that Agliotti’s role was to arrange police protection through Selebi.
Selebi has declined repeatedly to answer to specific allegations, but has issued broad denials of criminality—or of even knowing of Agliotti’s alleged crimes.
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| DKNY |
Agliotti now stands accused of using his mastery of the import-export game to subvert customs procedures and to facilitate the smuggling of drugs and contraband cigarettes. When the Scorpions raided him last year the search warrant authorised them to confiscate “documents that will indicate the existence of imported and or exported containers containing amongst other [things] clothing, engine parts, ceramic tiles, alcohol and tyres”, as well as waybills and customs clearance documents.
In the so-called Paparas trial, set down to start in October, he is accused of being the “Landlord” responsible for a R200-million shipment of hashish and marijuana.
Two sources sympathetic to Wingate-Pearse and Mazzotti denied they had done business with Yester-Garrido. However, one confirmed Agliotti had done customs clearing for Wingate-Pearse.
On April 23 2002, police, executing an Interpol warrant issued by US authorities, arrested Yester-Garrido near his upmarket Sandhurst, Johannesburg, home. At the time he was driving a Mercedes registered to Wingate-Pearse. Some of Wingate-Pearse’s business documents were found at his home.
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| Chris Couremetis |
The two sympathetic sources denied that Mazzotti and Wingate-Pearse knew at that stage of Yester-Garrido’s true identity and fugitive status. One denied the documents indicated a business relationship: Yester-Garrido had acted only as a translator for Wingate-Pearse in Angolan dealings, the source claimed.
Wingate-Pearse’s lawyer said the alleged passport was a photocopy, which proved nothing, and that until Yester-Garrido’s arrest his client had known him only as Antonio Lamas. “His true identity was never disclosed.”
After Yester-Garrido’s arrest, the heat was turned up on the Wingate-Pearse and Mazzotti families, culminating in an April 2005 Sars raid on 20 or more premises associated with them.
Legal authorities said “a large quantity of smuggled second-hand clothes” and R1-million in cash had been found. Wingate-Pearse denies that his activities were illegal.
Mazzotti and Wingate-Pearse appear to blame Agliotti for Yester-Garrido’s arrest and the raids on their premises.
The sources sympathetic to them said there was a strong suspicion that Paul Stemmet—another key figure in the Selebi-Agliotti saga—was initially involved in the Cuban’s arrest. Stemmet’s security firm, Palto, freelanced for police under Selebi’s orders, while maintaining close relations with Agliotti. However, a senior police source denied Stemmet’s involvement.
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| Gangland Boss Beeka |
One source said the arrest was completed by Superintendent Tallies Taljaard of the police organised crime unit—previously identified by the M&G as a police headquarters officer who acted as Palto’s paymaster. Taljaard also made a later affidavit, which Sars used in obtaining warrants for the raids on the Wingate-Pearses and Mazzottis, the M&G has established.
It is no secret that Agliotti acted as a police informer in the past. Wingate-Pearse’s lawyer confirmed his client had been “aware that Agliotti was a police informer, but did not consider the possibility that this may have led to any investigations”.
It is not uncommon for criminals, particularly in the drug trade, to seek informer status, as it can be manipulated to target competitors—and conceivably innocent parties—while buying indemnity for themselves.
It was during the Selebi trial that documents were produced, indicating the route into Britain.
UK Customs and Excise had contacted the South African police seeking information about Agliotti. He was accused of trafficking "significant quantities of cocaine to the UK" in association with others. The drugs, hidden in a container of furniture, would be flown from Venezuela to Angola and then driven by road to South Africa. According to the information, a dummy run had been conducted via Tilbury in 2004. Three "clean" containers would precede a further three "dirty" containers, which would be packed with drugs. A British associate; "Baldy John" was named in the document, complete with his address and mobile phone numbers.
Unfortunately for UK Customs and Excise, the docket was passed from Selebi to Agliotti, who shared it with Yester-Garrido. Agliotti subsequently turned state evidence, helping to convict the Police Commissioner, and escaped prosecution.
Open season of killing hoodlums
The South African police are currently searching for a number of others involved in the current cocaine shipment. These include Shane Paul Bhatti, who has lived in both Zambia and Zimbabwe. Warrant-Officer Els says he has spoken to Bhatti, who was considering handing himself in for questioning.
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| Lolly Jackson |
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| Yuri “The Russian” Ulianitski |
Yuri “The Russian” Ulianitski died in a hail of bullets as he was leaving a restaurant with his family in Milnerton, Cape Town. “The Russian”, one of the city’s most feared crime bosses, owned The Castle strip club and was out on bail on charges of conspiracy to kidnap, possession of illegal firearms and drugs and other offences when he died. His daughter, Yulia, 4, also died and his wife, Irina, was wounded. The late-night ambush happened while Ulianitski was driving in a black Audi Q7 4x4.
Lolly Jackson, controversial strip club franchise boss and money launderer, was gunned down on May 3 at the house of a friend, George “The Baker”, in Kempton Park. His body was riddled with 15 bullets fired from a .22 calibre firearm.
The man suspected of killing Jackson, Cypriot George Louka, allegedly contacted former Gauteng Crime Intelligence boss Joey Mabasa within minutes of the murder. Mabasa and two of his senior colleagues were the first police officers to arrive at the murder scene. Jackson’s neighbour in upmarket Bedfordview, Krejcir, and three associates also arrived on the scene Louka fled to Cyprus.
Krejcir was sentenced in absentia in the Czech Republic to six-and-a-half years imprisonment for tax fraud and reportedly investigated on charges of conspiracy to murder, counterfeiting, extortion and abduction – is a flamboyant man, given to ostentatious displays of wealth and power.
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| krejcir radovan |
He arrived in South Africa in 2007 and was arrested at OR Tambo international airport on an Interpol “red notice” while travelling with a Seychelles passport, issued in the name Egbert Jules Savy. An application for his extradition was unsuccessful.
Krejcir, who has applied for political asylum, has since ensconced himself in South Africa. He holds court at the Harbour Fish Market restaurant in the Bedford Centre, usually with one of his two Porsches, a Lamborghini Murcielago, a Ferrari Spider or a Mercedes parked in a private, roped-off bay near the front door. He has free reign of the restaurant.
One corner of the outside patio is shielded with bullet-proof glass, installed at Krejcir’s expense after he discovered that a “Russian hit team” had been sent to South Africa by the Czech government to snatch or kill him and planned to position snipers in a block of flats across the road from the restaurant.
Renowned German Porsche converter Uwe Gemballa disappeared in February 2010 soon after he arrived at OR Tambo International Airport. In October, his body, wrapped in cellophane, was found in a shallow grave near Atteridgeville, Pretoria West. In a most unusual way for the South African judiciary, Thabiso Mpshe, 28, was arrested, tried and convicted within a day and sentenced to 20 years.
It is extraordinary that he was arrested in the morning, and a day later started his jail term. Two men who were allegedly involved in kidnapping Gemballa from the airport are awaiting trial.
At the time of his coming to South Africa, Gemballa was involved in deals with Krejcir and Jackson. They aimed to set up a branch of Gemballa’s Porsche conversion business in South Africa. Though never seen again, Gemballa contacted his wife, Christiane, the day after he arrived in South Africa, asking her to urgently transfer €1m (R9.5m) into his bank account, as he had incurred unforeseen expenses. This was the last she heard from him.
Gemballa was facing investigations by the German authorities into alleged tax evasion and money laundering. It was alleged at the time that Gemballa’s much sought after sports car conversions were used to smuggle foreign currency into South Africa.
Gemballa had contacted Jerome Safi, a Krejcir associate, about the deal before he arrived in the country.
The funding, of up to R100-million, was going to come from Krejcir and slain Teazers boss Lolly Jackson.
In September 2010 Mpye led investigators to Gemballa's body. He also pointed out the house in Edenvale, Johannesburg, where Gemballa was held before being suffocated.
The house was rented to Krejcir's financial manager, Savov, who claimed he was out of the country at the time and denied Gemballa was killed at his home.A former business associate turned rival of Krejcir's, gold-refinery owner Juan Meyer, publicly claimed the Czech was using cars imported from Gemballa to smuggle cash into South Africa. Meyer claims that he overheard an angry telephone exchange between them about money owed to Krejcir in September 2009. The phone conversation related to a Porsche imported in September 2009 and the fact that, when it arrived, the cash it was supposed to contain was missing.
In his affidavit, Meyer stated: "Radovan said that if Gemballa did not pay, he would get trouble." Krejcir has denied that he ever mentioned Gemballa's name to Meyer.
Krejcir denied involvement in Gemballa's kidnapping and murder. "I saw Gemballa once in my life for a couple of minutes at a car show in Prague in 1995.
"This is…the first and last time I saw him, not only saw him, even talked to him. But maybe it is the reason why I want to kill him, because I saw him 15 years ago?"
South Africa became an important element in the global illicit drugs trade at the end of apartheid. Border controls were reduced as the authorities fighting against the African National Congress evaporated. As the Vienna-based UN Office on Drugs and Crime report for 2012 put it:
The subsequent end to decades of international isolation also increased South Africa’s exposure to transnational drug trafficking, which led in turn to increased domestic illicit drug use. Traffickers also took advantage of the country’s good infrastructure and South Africa emerged as a transit hub for cocaine shipments from South America destined for Europe, as well as for heroin shipments from Afghanistan and Pakistan destined for Europe.
International drugs syndicates from the Italian Mafia to the Chinese Triads found a safe haven for their operations. South Africa was used to trade in everything from rhino horn to abalone and marijuana. Some of these networks had been established well before Nelson Mandela took over the presidency. Others were linked to the ANC’s operations in exile.
Repeated attempts to extradite organised crime bosses from South Africa have failed. South Africa’s strict protection of human rights has proved a serious obstacle, preventing alleged criminals from facing justice in other jurisdictions. Vito Palazzolo, a convicted Mafia banker, who was involved in the 1970s pizzeria opium smuggling made famous in the film The French Connection lived happily in South Africa and Namibia since the 1980s. It was only when he went to Thailand to visit his son that he was finally arrested and extradited to the Italy, where he has already been convicted.
Britain’s Serious Organised Crime Agency, SOCA, is well aware of these activities. While they would not comment on the documents from the Selebi case or the operations of Yester-Garrido, they did issue this statement. “SOCA remains alive to established and emerging organised crime threats. Understanding and tackling the efforts of criminals to traffic class A drugs towards Europe and the UK, including via the African continent, is an ongoing priority, and we work with partner agencies domestically and internationally to protect the UK public from the impact of the Class A drugs trade."
UPDATE Feb 2013
Drug charges against Yester-Garrido dropped. The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) on Friday said the reason charges were withdrawn against a controversial former Cuban intelligence officer is because no one was available to translate Brazilian official documents into English. Nelson Yester-Garrido was arrested in 2010 in connection with a massive cocaine bust.
He was also previously arrested at his home in Hyde Park in northern Johannesburg following the circulation of an Interpol warrant stating he was wanted in the United States on drugs smuggling charges.
NPA spokesperson Tshepo Ndwalaza said, “We are not in a position to confirm when the charges will be brought back.
“We are sure that as time goes on we will be able to reinstate the charges when we have done the necessary preparations.”