Ace Magashule’s former driver gets 15 years in jail for stealing R8m painting
A man employed as Ace Magashule’s bodyguard when he was premier of the Free State has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for stealing a Pierneef painting worth R8m.
Ricardo Mettler, 43, was sentenced in the Bloemfontein high court on Wednesday.
He was found guilty of theft, money laundering and fraud in December last year.
Mettler was also found guilty of making a false statement to the police in which he said Magashule gave him the painting as a present.
This followed a trial regarding the disappearance of the painting from the provincial government’s OR Tambo House in Bloemfontein. Mettler stole the painting in March 2018 while helping to clear Magashule’s office.