Stumped as to what to do after his ex-mistress dumped a baby on his doorstep, a married man lied to his wife and police, claming he had found the infant abandoned in the bushes.
The 27-year-old Walmer man said his wife had been on her way home and he had panicked about what to do with the screaming baby boy.
The man pleaded guilty in the Port Elizabeth Magistrate’s Court last week to a charge of perjury – or making a false statement.
He was ordered to pay a fine of R2,000, or undergo 12 months’ imprisonment, wholly suspended for three years on condition that he not commit a similar offence in that period.
He was also declared unfit to possess a firearm.
He is not being named to protect the identity of the child, who is now a toddler.
In a plea statement read into the record by defence attorney Louis van Rensburg, the man said he had not yet had a paternity test to confirm whether or not he was indeed the child’s biological father.
“I was involved in a relationship with a lady during 2017,” he told magistrate Thembeka Mashiyi.
“She had a baby and told me that I am the father of the child.
“When this lady with whom I had a relationship found out that I had a wife as well, she became very angry.”
The man said the woman – who is not named in his statement – had arrived at his house at about 5pm on November 12 2017 with the baby, claiming he was the father.
“She fought and argued with me, and just left the baby with me and then ran off.
“I panicked and did not know what to do with the child, also given the fact that I was married.
“I went straight to the Walmer police station and made an affidavit under oath to the police, stating that I had found the baby boy in the bushes, abandoned.
“I then handed the child over to the police officer.”
The police became suspicious because the baby – wrapped in a blanket – seemed well taken care of.
On further investigation, the man admitted to having lied under oath.
He told the court he knew at the time that the contents of his affidavit before a commissioner of oaths were false.