Drug Pusher Wins His Case

In probably the most bizarre case I have ever come across, a drug merchant obtained an order against a drug abuser for the abuser’s unpaid drug bill.

Whether the judgment is valid is another matter – an illegal transaction (the supply of drugs) is unenforceable.

Drug merchant Ofon Memye claimed R3 400 from abuser Johannes Coetzee, but disguised the claim as repayment of a loan, for which Coetzee had pawned his bakkie as security.

Memye told Commissioner Noel Woods, in the Cape Town Small Claims Court, that Coetzee had repaid R1 000 of the R4 400 loan the very day he had received the loan, and that the remaining R3 400 was repayable the next day, when he had accompanied Coetzee in the bakkie to a bank to draw the remaining R3 400.

Coetzee had gone into the bank, leaving Memye waiting in the bakkie with the ignition keys.

Memye said Coetzee did not return, and Memye then found out that Coetzee had left the bank via the back door and disappeared.

Memye said he had not been too concerned, as he had the bakkie and keys as security, but when he checked the registration number he discovered the vehicle in fact belonged to a company called Cape Boilers

Cape Boilers told Memye it was not the first time that Coetzee had “sneaked off” at night with the company’s vehicle, and that on this occasion he had reported losing the bakkie in a hijack.

As his trump card, Memye produced a hand-written, signed agreement, in which Coetzee acknowledged that he owed R3 4000.

Coetzee lamented that the agreement was “not kosher”.

He said he had visited Memye’s Green Point premises, with two young women (of questionable repute), and they had stayed for the night.

Coetzee said Memye had plied them with an unnamed substance, and he added: “The more you have of it, the more you want, and he just kept coming with more.”

The next morning, Memye had presented him with a bill for R4 400 for the drugs, but all Coetzee had on him was R1 000.

Memye did not deny or try to refute Coetzee’s story.

Coetzee did not even know how much of the drug he and his companions had consumed, but he said: “It was a bit of a problem, and it got out of hand – I virtually lost everything.”

Asked why he had allowed the matter to go to court, Coetzee said: “I was embarrassed and did not want it to go to court. I asked him to keep it quiet, and said I will pay.

“I offered R200 a week, but he went to my employer instead.”

Coetzee again offered R200 a week ( in court), but Memye demanded “at least R500”.

Commissioner Woods told Coetzee: “If you buy drugs, you have to pay for them.”

He ruled R350 a week was reasonable.