Jason Rohde back in court to appeal conviction
Rohde was sentenced to an effective 20 years in February.
Jason Rohde, the businessman convicted of murdering his wife, arrived at the high court in Cape Town on 5 December 2018 to listen to evidence in his sentencing proceedings. Picture: Armand Hough / African News Agency (ANA)
Convicted murderer Jason Rohde continues his application to appeal his conviction and sentence in the Western Cape High Court on Tuesday.
Rohde’s application for an appeal on his sentence will be heard today, as he maintains his wife may have killed herself after finding out about his affair with a coworker.
In February, Judge Gayaat Salie-Hlophe was calm and measured as she read out her reasoning for sentencing Rohde, for the murder of his wife Susan.
Calling Rohde “selfish and self-serving”, Salie-Hlophe listed the damage that the death of Susan had done to Rohde’s own children and described her as being a caring person who clearly loved her family before handing down a sentence of effectively 20 years imprisonment.
Rohde was arrested shortly after the body of Susan was found on July 24, 2016, with an electric cord wrapped around her neck, hanging from a hook behind the bathroom door of the room the couple shared at the Spier Wine Estate hotel in Stellenbosch.
In November last year, Western Cape High Court Judge Gayaat Salie-Hlophe found Rohde guilty of murder and obstructing the ends of justice by staging her suicide.
On February 18, the sentencing proceedings of Rohde resumed after the trial adjourned on December 6.
On February 20, both parties, defence advocate Graham van der Spuy and state prosecutor Louis van Niekerk, presented their final arguments.
(Additional reporting by ANA)
For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.
