Eight years since his arrest, and after spending more than two years behind bars, Julian Brown once labelled Gqeberha’s perlemoen kingpin is finally a free man.
Gqeberha man Julian Brown has been acquitted of all perlemoen and racketeering charges after three judges of the Makhanda high court set aside his conviction on Tuesday morning.
An investigation initiated by the National Treasury into how much had been paid to the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality for the implementation of the Integrated Public Transport System (IPTS) is what led to forensic investigators uncovering an alleged scheme by high-ranking officials, municipal employees and business people.
Volumes of exhibits, including nine lever-arch files containing bank statements of those allegedly involved in the multimillion-rand Integrated Public Transport System (IPTS) fraud case, set the tone for proceedings in the high court on Monday.