(NEWZIMBABWE) Cape hotel plunge man 'molested' Zimbabwean

COMMENT - Peter Roebuck even looks like Peter Mandelson. Just an observation.

Cape hotel plunge man 'molested' Zimbabwean
14/11/2011 00:00:00
by Staff Reporter

A BRITISH man who leapt to his death from the window of a Cape Town hotel was facing accusations of sexually assaulting a 26-year-old Zimbabwean man, reports said Monday. Former cricketer Peter Roebuck, who was covering a Test match between Australia and South Africa for Australia’s ABC TV channel, jumped from the 6th floor of the Southern Sun hotel to his death last Saturday after being visited by detectives.

South Africa’s New Age newspaper said a Zimbabwean man had walked into the nearby Claremont police station and laid charges of indecent assault against the former Somerset captain.

The man told police he had befriended Roebuck on Facebook. The broadcaster had arrived in Cape Town on November 7 and invited his accuser to discuss a university sponsorship, but instead subjected him to an attempted sexual assault.

Jim Maxwell, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's main commentator, said he left Roebuck's hotel room "less than a minute" before the 55-year-old plunged from the window.

"He was in a state of utter despair – apoplectic," said Maxwell. "He was sitting in a chair near the window. It takes just five seconds to open that window. Given his emotional state, he must have suffered a brain explosion and out he went."

Mistrusted by many in the sport, all along Roebuck was hiding demons. They became horribly public when he was convicted of common assault in 2001.

After retirement, Roebuck had taken to sponsoring promising young overseas cricketers, inviting them to his home near Taunton for coaching. But when he canned three 19-year-old boys he had brought in from South Africa across their bare buttocks, they took him to court.

One of them is reported to have said: “The problem wasn’t so much that he canned us, but wanted to examine the marks. That’s when I decided to get out of his house.”

"We all have our demons," said Maxwell. "People will make assumptions about Peter because of that sentence 10 years ago. But as far as I know nothing untoward ever happened with all the young people Peter supported.
"He spent thousands of dollars of his own money helping people and supporting cricket. He was a philanthropist.”

After his legal troubles in the UK, Roebuck moved to South Africa where he continued coaching promising youngsters and secured a lucrative contract as a commentator.

To some who knew him, it was clear he was troubled.

Roebuck contributed a chapter to David Frith’s book, ‘By His Own Hand’.

On Monday, Frith told Channel 4 News: “He worried you a little because there was an evident dark side. He would laugh, he would joke and then he would look all serious and you wondered how many personality strands were within that body.”