Dumisani Hamilton Zondi (born 23 December 1957) is a South African judge who is the Deputy President of the Supreme Court of Appeal.
He had been asked to apply for the position by Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe,[3] whom he had met at the University of Fort Hare and of whom he was considered a "protege".
[4] However, as an acting judge, Zondi had recently imposed an unusually lax sentence on a child rapist, and his interview was diverted by criticism of that judgement from commissioners including George Bizos and Lindiwe Hendricks;[4] the Judicial Service Commission did not recommend him for appointment.
On 28 May 2007, President Thabo Mbeki appointed Zondi permanently to the bench of the Western Cape High Court, following another round of interviews with the Judicial Service Commission.
[1] In May 2011, on the advice of the Judicial Service Commission, President Jacob Zuma appointed him to a permanent ten-year term in the Competition Appeal Court.
He was viewed as one of the frontrunners and was a popular candidate among Western Cape lawyers, but the Johannesburg Bar did not support his elevation, writing that he still had the "potential to develop further as a high court judge".
[9] He had a brief interview, with the Supreme Court's Lex Mpati reporting that appellate judges had "no problems" with him, and the Judicial Service Commission recommended him for appointment.
[13] He wrote the Constitutional Court's majority judgement in Levenstein v Estate of the Late Sidney Lewis Frankel, which declared Section 18 of the Criminal Procedure Act to be unconstitutional insofar as it prescribed a 20-year limit on the prosecution of certain sexual offences.