Percy Yutar - Biography

Dr. Percy Yutar (29 July 1911, Cape Town-13 July 2002, Johannesburg) was South Africa’s first Jewish attorney-general. Yutar was one of eight children in a family of Lithuanian immigrants. His father originally spelled his surname as Yuter before arriving in South Africa.[1]

Yutar began his career as a lawyer in Johannesburg and later became a junior law clerk in Pretoria’s Palace of Justice. In 1940, he was appointed a junior state prosecutor and eventually become the Deputy Attorney General for the Transvaal. Yutar frequently suffered from anti-semitism, and was at first forbidden from joining the attorney general's office in Cape Town because a Jew appearing for the state in court was anathema at the time.

He prosecuted Nelson Mandela in the 1963 Rivonia Treason Trial and pursued the death sentence. Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment for sabotage as a result of the trial. Yutar was said to be indifferent towards Apartheid.

Decades later, Mandela displayed kindness towards Yutar. In November 1995, the then South African President Mandela invited Yutar to lunch, which included a kosher meal. Mandela agreed with Yutar that he [Yutar] had played a minor role in the conviction and was doing his duty as prosecutor.

Notes

<references/>