Chief magistrates across the country have begun to publish updated lockdown admission of guilt penalties.<\/p>\n
The schedules are based on provincial and magistrate districts and are in line with the new level 3 lockdown regulations, introduced in June and July.<\/p>\n
The South African Police Service can give a person who has been arrested on suspicion of a less serious crime an option to pay an admission of guilt fine.<\/p>\n
Such a fine allows a person to admit guilt for a less serious offence without having to appear in court, thereby preventing an unnecessary overload of the court system.<\/p>\n
It is also meant to resolve less serious matters quickly where an accused person accepts responsibility for having committed a minor offence. However, an admission of guilt comes with a criminal record.<\/p>\n
Thousands of people<\/a><\/strong> have already paid an admission of guilt fine since the National State of Disaster was first declared, while just under 200,000 were scheduled to appear in court.<\/p>\n While the fines differ between regions, the below table provides an idea of what you can expect to pay based on the latest directive<\/a> <\/strong>for KwaZulu-Natal.<\/p>\n It should be noted that some offences do not have an association of guilt fine attached, possibly a sign of their perceived severity under the revised level 3 lockdown rules. These offences include:<\/p>\n You can find the most up to date schedules for each province under the ‘Covid-19 guilty fines’ tab here<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n
\n Charge<\/th>\n Fine<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n \n Intentionally making a misrepresentation that any person is infected with Covid-19.<\/td>\n R3 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure by a driver or operator of any form of public transport to take reasonable steps to ensure a passenger wears a mask.<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure by a manager or owner of a building, place or premises, used by the public to obtain goods or services, to ensure that members of the public wear a mask.<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure by an employer to provide every employee with a cloth face mask or allows an employee to perform any duties or enter the premises without a mask.<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure by a principal of a school to ensure that the relevant authority supplies it with sufficient masks.<\/td>\n R500<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Convening of an illegal gathering during the national state of disaster.<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure to be confined to his or her place of residence from 21h00 – 04h00 daily (it should be noted that the curfew now starts at 22h00<\/a><\/strong>).<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Attends or hosts a night vigil.<\/td>\n R500<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Evicting or causing\u00a0 a person to be evicted from their home under alert level 3 without court authorisation.<\/td>\n R3 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Holding or arranging an initiation school.<\/td>\n R2 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure to keep a place or premises, normally open to the public, where sporting, cultural, entertainment, leisure, exhibitional, organisational or similar activities should be closed for the duration of the national state of disaster.<\/td>\n R3 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Failure by a bus or taxi service to carry 70% or less of the licensed capacity for provincial travel.<\/td>\n R1 000<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table><\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n
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