Post date: Mar 30, 2012 12:33:26 PM
LONDON, UK (MARCH 30, 2012) (ITN) - The extradition to South Africa of a British man accused of conspiring to kill his wife in a fake car-jacking during the couple's honeymoon in Cape Town was temporarily halted by London's High Court on Friday (March 30) over concerns for his mental health.
The High Court temporarily halts British businessman Shrien Dewani's extradition to South Africa on mental health grounds.
Millionaire Shrien Dewani, 31, has fought extradition proceedings, arguing that he is suffering from severe post-traumatic stress disorder and is too unwell to be sent abroad for trial.
Last August, however, a judge approved the extradition, a decision subsequently upheld by Home Secretary Theresa May. But on Friday, High Court judge Sir John Thomas said it would be unjust and oppressive to send Dewani back to South Africa in his present condition, adding it would be in the interests of justice that Dewani is tried in South Africa as soon as he is fit to be tried.
Anni Dewani, 28 and from Sweden, was shot when the taxi the couple were travelling in was hijacked in the Gugulethu township on the outskirts of Cape Town last November.
She was found dead in the back of the abandoned cab with a bullet wound to her neck after cabbie Zola Tongo drove the newlyweds to the township.
"It would be oppressive to send him back if his health is not good. But we are happy as the family to hear that the court has decided that it is in the interest of justice that he will go back to South Africa. The court has rejected his appeal on human rights. I feel, and we feel, that there are a lot of delays and it is very painful for us, but we want to get to the truth about what happened to our sister Anni. We just want him to get better now so he can finally go to South Africa and tell us what happened. She added: "We just want to know the truth because it is all about our dearest little sister who was murdered," Anni's elder sister Ami Deborg told media after judge's decision to temporarily halt Dewani's extradition to South Africa.
Shrien Dewani claims the vehicle was carjacked and that he and cabbie Zola Tongo were forced out of the car unharmed before Mrs Dewani was driven away and killed.
However, Tongo turned state witness and, in return for a reduced sentence, alleged that Dewani paid for his wife to be killed.