Racism-accused Vicki Momberg expected in court today

Real estate agent Vicki Momberg is expected to appear in the Randburg Magistrate’s Court today with her new attorney, Jenna Clark, from Alexandra Justice Centre Legal Aid Clinic.

It is heading towards a year since Momberg’s rant against black people during a phone call, which someone recorded on a mobile device and uploaded to YouTube, from where it went viral. Momberg was arrested in June.

At her last appearance, prosecutor Yusuf Baba promised to make a copy of the docket, videos and audio recordings available to Clark after Momberg’s previous attorney withdrew from the case. The case was remanded until today so Clark could study all the material and take instruction from Momberg.

At the time, Baba said the case had been delayed for months and warned Clark the next remand would be for trial. Momberg is accused of crimen injuria after shouting at black police officers in Northriding in Johannesburg following an alleged smash-and-grab incident.

“One k****r is bad enough. This happens all the time, all the time. The k*****s here in Johannesburg are terrible, I’m so sick of it,” Momburg was recorded in the video as saying.

“They’re opinionated, they’re arrogant and they’re just plain and simply useless!” Momberg said. Former estate agent Penny Sparrow, whose January 2016 racist rant about black people on a Durban beach was posted on Facebook, was fined R5 000 by the Scottburgh Magistrate’s Court, after she pleaded guilty to a charge of crimen injuria‚ and R150 000 by the Equality Court.

In November, Cape Town DA Ward 54 councillor Shayne Ramsay said in a Facebook post that people living on the streets of Sea Point were “criminals‚ mentally retarded or social outcasts and those who are genuinely down on their luck”.

This month, Limpopo man Phillip Roodt called black bathers at Amanzimtoti “cockroaches” on Facebook. He wrote: “Good afternoon from a pitch-black Amanzimtoti where the sea is a tar road full of potholes. Dear damn I can’t believe how many black cockroaches are having a holiday on stolen money and on robbed white people’s tax money. I hope the f***ers drown one by one.”

– amandaw@citizen.co.za