NELSPRUIT – A serial fraudster appeared briefly in court on Thursday morning. Louis Hechroodt appeared on charges of fraud after he was arrested and detained in custody since the beginning of the month.
Hechroodt was apprehended on October 5. It was alleged that he had committed fraud to the value of R50 000 against BUCO, a building material supplier, where he had been working as a workshop manager for the past three months.
The accused allegedly failed to pay suppliers, pocketing the money instead. Of the total, he has apparently repaid approximately R11 000 to BUCO.
Hechroodt has a history of fraud. In April, he was rearrested for a 2010 case against him in Linden, Johannesburg, where he had forged proof of payments with a company.
In March, his former employer, Sharp, also laid charges against him after he had apparently sold stock and kept the money.
In February, he was rearrested after he had allegedly forged payment to a vehicle company. At that time, he was out on bail on three previous cases of fraud and one case of theft of a docket against him.
One of his previous charges was for allegedly forging evidence of Internet payments to buy tickets to the value of
R18 400 for the Innibos Festival in 2012.
The others were from Xerox and another vehicle company.
He was also supposed to have stolen one of the police dockets on him out of a prosecutor’s office.
Hechroodt told the court previously that he intended to plead guilty to the charges.
His case has been postponed until November 8.
