Zane Kilian appears in court for attempted murder of Booth

Zane Kilian leaves the Cape Town Magistrates Court.

• Zane Kilian has appeared in Cape Town Magistrates Court on charges related to the attempted murder of attorney William Booth.
• This stemmed from investigations into the murder of Gang Unit detective Charl Kinnear.
• As the sixth defendant in the Booth shooting, he has now been involved in a case the state alleges involves a gang in Cape Town’s Woodstock.

Zane Kilian appeared in Cape Town Magistrates Court Tuesday on charges related to the attempted murder of attorney William Booth.

This new fact is related to the investigation into the murder of Lieutenant Colonel Charl Kinnear, a detective with the Anti-Gang Unit (AGU), in front of his home in Bishop Lavis, on September 18.

Kilian was brought in from Gauteng for the Booth shooting case and has become the sixth defendant after five people were previously arrested.

It is understood that he became involved in the matter due to investigators’ preliminary analysis of cell phone tracking.

In the Kinnear affair, Kilian, a private investigator, also faces charges of alleged violation of telecommunications laws related to a so-called “ping list” containing thousands of numbers belonging to people whose locations were tracked.

Kilian climbed the steps of the holding cells to the Cape Town Magistrates Court dock on Tuesday with a front guard of AGU members with rifles wearing bulletproof vests, and was followed by more heavily armed officers who stood around of the court.

Booth was in the garage of his home in Cape Town on April 9 when he was shot.

He was not physically injured, but was shaken.

READ | Charl Kinnear murder: Zane Kilian denies being part of the murder, claims the follow-up was legal

The five people previously arrested were charged when police took CCTV footage after the shooting at Booth’s home and distributed descriptions of the shooters to the public.

Riyaad Gasant, Kim Smith, Kauther Brown, Igsaan Williams and Ibrahim Deare have already appeared in court. They weren’t in court with Kilian on Tuesday.

Kilian’s case related to the Booth shooting was postponed until November 10 and he will be transferred from police holding cells in Bellville to Goodwood Prison.

The charge sheet includes allegations of a Woodstock gang operating on the outskirts of Cape Town’s CBD.

His bail requests in the Booth and Kinnear matters could be joined.

Outside of court, National Fiscal Authority (NPA) spokesman Eric Ntabazalila said the state intended to oppose the bail.

The charges the six face in the Booth affair individually or collectively include attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder and illegal wiretapping, as well as illegal possession of a firearm and ammunition.

Detectives at the location where a car used by the suspects during the Booth shooting was recovered in May.

Jaco Marais, Gallo Images

In the Kinnear affair on Monday, Bishop Lavis’s court heard that Kilian was allegedly registered as a private investigator and registered with the Private Security Industry Regulatory Authority.

You face an additional charge of fraud in that case related to one of the documents presented by your defense team regarding your security industry credentials.

He was due to apply for bail in Bellville court on Monday, but the case took a new turn with Booth’s shooting charges.

He left Cape Town Magistrates Court on Tuesday in a blaze of sirens with a large police escort.

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