British honeymoon murder husband remanded in custody

The Bristol-based newlywed accused of paying to have his bride killed on their South African honeymoon is to be held in jail after an appeal was lodged against the granting of £250,000 bail.

Shrien Dewani, who was arrested on Tuesday night on a South African extradition warrant, was initially granted bail when he appeared at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court yesterday.

But the South African authorities lodged an immediate appeal, which means the businessman from Bristol will be held in custody pending a High Court hearing. Mr Dewani, whose wife Anni, 28, was shot dead last month as they visited a township, was arrested on suspicion of conspiring to murder her.

The 30-year-old was accused of ordering her death by taxi driver Zola Tongo as he was sentenced for his part in the killing in a South African court on Tuesday.

The court heard that Mr Tongo had not only implicated Mr Dewani in the murder, but had also mentioned to another man that he thought it was not the first time the Briton had arranged such a killing.

The taxi driver said he got the impression that Mr Dewani had been in South Africa before and “had done something like this before and said he wanted the murder to look like a hijacking”, according to a statement given to South African police by an alleged middle-man.

Acting for the South African authorities, lawyer Ben Watson told the extradition hearing that Mr Dewani had met Mr Tongo at Cape Town international airport and arranged for him to take him and his new bride to their hotel and to act as their tour guide. As their guide, Mr Tongo collected the couple from their hotel and took them out for dinner at a seafood restaurant.

On their way back, they passed through the dangerous Gugulethu township, where the allegedly pre-ordered hijacking took place, Mr Watson said.

The suspicions of the South African authorities were aroused by the fact that the couple did not make use of the airport-to-hotel shuttle service, hiring Mr Tongo to take them to their hotel instead, they also viewed a restaurant that was known to be closed at the time of their visit, and neither Mr Dewani nor the taxi driver were even injured in the incident, while Mrs Dewani was brutally killed, City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard.

Outlining the alleged sequence of events, Mr Watson told the court that Mr Tongo apparently told the middle-man he was looking for a hitman to murder someone. Having found a potential candidate, Xolile Mnguni, the taxi driver told him he would be “bringing a couple into the town that evening and the husband wanted his wife murdered”.