Michelle van der Merwe was admitted as an attorney on 22 January 2025 by two judges of the High Court in Pretoria. Her application for admission was opposed by journalist Tony Beamish on numerous grounds.
Two of these grounds were that he had been framed by her for sexual assault and that she had, whilst being employed by a Johannesburg Senior Counsel, conspired to frame the arbitrator in a commercial arbitration in which her boss has been appearing.
Beamish has evidence that at the date and time on which he had allegedly sexually assaulted Ms van der Merwe, he was asleep in bed. He also has other exculpatory evidence in his quiver.
The arbitrator in the commercial arbitration was none other than retired Supreme Court of Appeal Justice Fritz Brand.
Van der Merwe had emailed fugitive attorney Ronald Bobroff, inter alia, offering in regard to Beamish, “If I can ever assist you in any way to sort out this person, please don’t hesitate to contact me.” Within hours Bobroff directed van der Merwe to the premises of Paul O’Sullivan where she spent six hours. What followed was a protection order application against Beamish launched on 19 December 2019, prepared with the assistance of Ronald Bobroff and private investigator Paul O’Sullivan. Beamish opposed the application and pointed out that some two months and a half months earlier that she has in a WhatsApp to a third party inquired concerning Justice Brand:
“Ons soek iets soos antuigings van seksuele aanranding, belastingontduiking ens”.
Translated:
“We are looking for something like allegations of sexual assault, tax evasion, etc.”
Beamish raised this in his opposition to the harassment court application, stating:
“When the above is considered in the context of this application, the facts that I set out below and the events from June 2019 to date, including the involvement of Paul O’ Sullivan it will become an inescapable conclusion that the applicant is not credible and is not approaching this court with the proverbial clean hands.”
Van der Merwe admitted trying to conjure up allegations against Justice Brand by saying under oath:
8.1 I admit that I sent the message quoted to X, but I deny that I have ever asked X to source information of an untoward nature on Judge Brand.
8.2 This message is taken out of context and a nothing but an attack on my character and a transparent attempt to coerce me into withdrawing this application and the criminal charges against the Respondent.
8.3 This communication was intercepted by the Respondent in contravention of Section 2 of The Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-Related Information Act 70 of 2002, as is evident from correspondence between X and myself annexed to my Further Supplementary Affidavit dated 26 January 2020 as ‘Annexure C’.
8.4 This message therefore constitutes inadmissible evidence by reason of being irrelevant and in addition, unlawfully obtained.
On 4 November 2024 Ms van der Merwe sought to be admitted as an attorney and the matter was called before Madam Justices Fiona Dippenaar and Denise Lenyai. These Justices ordered that van der Merwe explain the Justice Brand issue, which she did on 13 November 2024:
51. During or about 2019 I was employed by senior counsel as a personal assistant whilst I was still a student. I do not wish to disclose her identity and will refer to her as Adv R SC.
- Advocate R SC represented a party in an arbitration. The arbitrator was retired Justice Brandt (sic).
- Adv R SC believed she had been treated unfairly and that the arbitrator discriminated against her, because she was a woman.
- On one particular day she returned from the arbitration to her chambers, she was visibly upset and instructed me to source information regarding the retired judge from the internet.
- She instructed me to look for any information regarding possible misconduct on his part and suggested I should investigate if there had been any complaints of discrimination or sexual misconduct.
- Adv R SC was my only source of income, and I was extremely apprehensive as to how to handle the instruction. I sent a text message to X because I was unsure on how to deal with the situation.
- Following the initial proceedings, Adv R. SC and Justice Brandt agreed to mediation in Johannesburg, during which the grievances between them were resolved.
- At the time, Mr Beamish was a close friend/associate of X. It appears he exploited this relationship to screenshot X’s private WhatsApp messages. The aforementioned WhatsApp communication sent by me to my X pertaining to Adv R SC’s instruction was an instance of a message extracted by Mr Beamish from X’s computer.
- I did not follow up on the instruction. A full record of the messages would have shown that I was unable to understand why Counsel R. SC would provide me with such an instruction.”
Madam Justices Dippenaar and Lenyai did not regard the Justice Fritz Brand issues as being “irrelevant” and van der Merwe was obliged to deal with it, as she did.
On 22 January 2025, following a perfunctory reading of Ms van der Merwe’s application for admission as an attorney, Judge Patrick Kumalo and Acting Judge Philemon Ledwaba (no relation to respected Gauteng Judge President designate, Aubrey Ledwaba) admitted her as an attorney.
Within a week of van der Merwe launching her harassment court application against Beamish, he was contacted by Michelle’s late grandfather, Koos van der Merwe MP, who had the following to say concerning his granddaughter;
Every single judge, magistrate, or other trier of fact ought to be aware that they too might find themselves being framed by Michelle van der Merwe. Ditto for anyone else that tries to get in the way of this lady achieving her desired outcome.
Read Ms van der Merwe’s WhatsApp message here:
Image credit: DeRebus.org.za