South Africa deports Mugabe's son after guilty pleas

A South African magistrate ordered the immediate deportation of Bellarmine Chatunga Mugabe, the youngest son of Zimbabwe's late former president Robert Mugabe, on Wednesday following his guilty pleas to immigration violations and pointing an object resembling a firearm.

The ruling came at the Alexandra Magistrates Court in Johannesburg, where Mugabe, 28, was fined 600,000 rand (about $36,000) on two counts or faced up to 24 months in prison in default. Police were directed to escort him to OR Tambo International Airport for deportation to Zimbabwe. His cousin and co-accused, Tobias Matonhodze, 32, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and related charges stemming from the February 19 shooting of a gardener at the family's home in Johannesburg's upscale Hyde Park neighborhood. Matonhodze received an effective three-year prison sentence, with concurrent terms, and faces deportation after serving his time.

The incident unfolded during an altercation between the two men and the gardener, identified in court as a security guard. Prosecutors said the victim was assaulted, shot in the back while fleeing, and collapsed outside the property gate, where a neighbor's guard found him and...