Community activists have vowed to block any effort a suspected serial child molester makes to get bail.
The 66-year-old Lansdowne man is accused of preying on the community’s children over the course of several months last year.
The accused, who owns a panel-beating business in Ottery, is facing eight charges, including rape and sexual assault. His alleged victims range in age from 7 to 18.
Police say more charges could follow and more children were expected to come forward.
Grassy Park police arrested the man at his home on Monday January 7.
The accused appeared briefly in court on Wednesday January 10 and again the following day when the case was postponed to tomorrow, Thursday January 17.
He was not asked to plead and was remanded in custody at Pollsmoor Prison.
The accused has denied all the charges, according to Grassy Park police station commander, Colonel Dawood Laing.
Ottery community activist Melanie Arendse said children had approached her in September last year, claiming they had been sexually assaulted by a man who had picked them up at the old stables in George Way and at a supermarket parking lot in Ottery.
The children had told her how the man would drive them to
different areas, including a parking lot in Ottery, Klip Road cemetery, “The Dam” across Strandfontein Road and other spots.
After giving the boys an ointment to rub on their penises, the man would get them to penetrate him from behind.
He had also fellated them. “This was a secret that they kept between them,” she said.
The grandmother of an 11-year-old boy who was allegedly one of the accused’s victims, said the man had picked her grandson up at the Pick * Pay Hypermarket and had driven to “The Dam” where he had told the child to rub “an ointment” on his penis.
“Then he told my grandson to have sex with him from behind and play with his penis and paid him R36. He had been doing this from late October to November last year,” she said.
Child rights activist Lucinda Evans said convicted rapists should get the maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
“These children need long-term therapy and intervention and we appeal for assistance,” said Ms Evans.
The man is expected to appear at Wynberg Magistrate’s Court for a formal bail hearing on Tuesday January 29. Residents have vowed to be there to protest against him getting bail.