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Moments after the end of their trial yesterday, a row was already brewing when Nicolette and Hardus Lotter\u2019s former lawyer, Danie Grundlingh, handed out a press release announcing the immediate release of his book on the \u201ctrue story\u201d of the murders of Johan and Rickie Lotter. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe have no knowledge of this,\u201d said the siblings\u2019 uncle, the Reverend Willem Lotter. <\/p>\n
While he said he had \u201cno comment\u201d at this stage, other relatives told The Mercury privately that they would \u201cexplore it further\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s offering to sell it (the book) to us from the boot of his car,\u201d said one. \u201cWhat is going on?\u201d <\/p>\n
Nicolette\u2019s advocate, Theuns Botha, said she had asked him to investigate the possibility of interdicting the book\u2019s release. <\/p>\n
She had told Botha that she believed she might have \u201csigned over certain rights to Grundlingh\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cSomebody from his office was visiting her in jail and she thought it was part of the legal consultation (for the murder trial). Then she discovered that he was gathering information for a book. She fired Grundlingh,\u201d said Botha. <\/p>\n
\u201cI approached him personally and asked him if the story about the book was true. He denied it, saying he was leaving South Africa to live overseas. But I was told by people at Westville prison that he has been visiting Hardus regularly.\u201d <\/p>\n
The book, Innocent Acts of Evil<\/em>, is being punted as \u201cthe true story of the murders through the eyes of Hardus Lotter\u201d. <\/p>\n While Grundlingh is named as the author, he told The Mercury it was the product of a \u201cproject team\u201d he had put together. <\/p>\n He said he knew his motives would be questioned, but he had the \u201ckids\u2019 best interests at heart\u201d. <\/p>\n Grundlingh came on the scene soon after the siblings were arrested, along with Mathew Naidoo, for the July 2008 murders. <\/p>\n Ostracised by their relatives, the two had little emotional support and no financial resources. Grundlingh was reportedly asked to assist them by members of the Westville Baptist Church, where Nicolette was once a parishioner. <\/p>\n A strong believer in their innocence, at one stage he unsuccessfully applied to the Durban High Court for them to get money from their parents\u2019 estate to fund their defence. <\/p>\n He said yesterday that the \u201cproject team\u201d, whom he declined to identify, had been concerned after looking on Facebook and discovering that \u201ccertain journalists were trying to write the book\u201d. <\/p>\n \u201cWe also wanted to put the truth on record,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n Grundlingh said proceeds from the book \u2013 which had to be kept strictly under wraps until the trial was finalised \u2013 would be put into a trust. <\/p>\n \u201cThe trustees will then decide how the money will be disbursed and they (Nicolette and Hardus) will be able to make requests for money for, say, education,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n But first, he conceded, his expenses of \u201caround R500 000\u201d would have to be paid. This bill had been run up through \u201cexperts, editors and printing\u201d. <\/p>\n Grundlingh said Nicolette had initially been part of the project, but then she had had a dispute with Hardus and then one with him, \u201cand then I said I can\u2019t be her lawyer any more\u201d. <\/p>\n \u201cThe book was finished well before the trial started. I have always only acted in their best interests. I will make no profit from this. In fact, I have made a huge loss because I have never received a cent from anybody for what I have done for them,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cI am doing nothing wrong. The story is in the public domain anyway. How you can you stop it?\u201d <\/p>\n Grundlingh said he was marketing the book from his law firm and it was also available on the internet. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Moments after the end of their trial yesterday, a row was already brewing when Nicolette and Hardus Lotter\u2019s former lawyer, Danie Grundlingh, handed out a press release announcing the immediate release of his book on the \u201ctrue story\u201d of the murders of Johan and Rickie Lotter. \u201cWe have no knowledge of this,\u201d said the siblings\u2019 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-9127","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9127\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}