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Oscar Pistorius and Legal Theatre | Jerm Warfare · UK Column Radio

0:05
Speaker 1: My name is Jerm.
0:31
Speaker 2: This is Jerm Warfare. The Battle of Ideas. I invited
0:36
Speaker 2: you back to chat about the Oscar Pasterius trial that
0:42
Speaker 2: happened a number of years ago. Now, I know you
0:44
Speaker 2: weren't personally involved in that, so this is not about
0:46
Speaker 2: … No.
0:48
Speaker 3: I was personally involved in it.
0:49
Speaker 2: Oh, but you weren't involved in the court.
0:52
Speaker 3: That's what I mean. Not in the court, no. Well,
0:55
Speaker 3: I was employed by an American TV corporation to keep
0:59
Speaker 3: a watching brief and to report on the trial.
1:02
Speaker 2: Okay, so … So the obvious question is, why are
1:06
Speaker 2: we talking about it? Why is it relevant?
1:10
Speaker 3: I'm not sure why it's relevant now, but it's relevant
1:14
Speaker 3: from the point of view of, it's a very interesting
1:18
Speaker 3: chapter in the history of South Africa. Because Oscar Pistorius
1:24
Speaker 3: went from hero to zero rather rapidly. Hmm. and his
1:30
Speaker 3: early days, it was part of a chapter in my
1:34
Speaker 3: book that I wrote, and Judge Crickler advised me to
1:40
Speaker 3: take it out, which I did. You do not follow
1:44
Speaker 3: the advice of Judge Crickler ever. So he said to me,
1:48
Speaker 3: I wouldn't put it in if I were you, so
1:50
Speaker 3: I didn't put it in because the trial was still ongoing.
1:54
Speaker 3: But I sat through the entire trial and saw it
1:57
Speaker 3: on video camera and I watched Gerrie Nell and Barry Rue.
2:01
Speaker 3: Barry I know very well. And I watched them and
2:05
Speaker 3: the trial itself has had some unfortunate consequences subsequently. The
2:16
Speaker 3: cross-examination of Oscar Pistorius by Barry drew a lot of
2:20
Speaker 3: criticism at the time from legal practitioners in the country
2:24
Speaker 3: and outside the country. And Barry was also fairly robust
2:28
Speaker 3: in his cross-examination. But the point about that was that
2:34
Speaker 3: there were things... The real question about it was, was
2:40
Speaker 3: he guilty of murder or was he not guilty of murder?
2:43
Speaker 3: Let me tell you something quite interesting. I live in
2:46
Speaker 3: England in a little town called Woolpit, which is about
2:49
Speaker 3: a one-horse town as far... as close to a one-horse
2:53
Speaker 3: town as you can get with a horse still alive.
2:57
Speaker 3: And I was asked to give a talk in Wilpida.
3:01
Speaker 3: What did they want me to talk about? Oscar Pistorius.
3:05
Speaker 3: Right in the middle of the British felt.
3:10
Speaker 2: For those who don't know, let's just quickly go through
3:13
Speaker 2: what happened.
3:14
Speaker 3: All right. Well, Oscar Pistorius, as you know, was born
3:18
Speaker 3: in with grossly deformed limbs resulting in bilateral amputations. And
3:25
Speaker 3: he grew up without limbs. And somebody had the bright
3:28
Speaker 3: idea of fitting him with artificial blades upon which he
3:31
Speaker 3: learned to walk. And he learned to run on those.
3:35
Speaker 3: And he was a fit young man. And he obviously
3:39
Speaker 3: became fitter and fitter and better and better until he
3:42
Speaker 3: became an international star. to the extent where he was
3:47
Speaker 3: competing with able-bodied people. He was way ahead of the
3:52
Speaker 3: non-able-bodied fraternity. And he then competed with able-bodied folk in
4:00
Speaker 3: the Olympic Games. And is unique in that respect in
4:08
Speaker 3: many ways in that he managed to compete very successfully
4:12
Speaker 3: winning bronze.
4:13
Speaker 2: And that's also an important point here because he was
4:17
Speaker 2: so good on his blades. He was known as the
4:19
Speaker 2: Blade Runner that it became a hot debate in sports
4:24
Speaker 2: science as to whether or not he was actually gaining
4:28
Speaker 2: an advantage over able-bodied runners.
4:32
Speaker 3: That's right. There was a lot of research done on
4:35
Speaker 3: whether he was actually getting an advantage over able-bodied runners.
4:39
Speaker 3: And I'm not sure what the outcome of that was,
4:43
Speaker 3: but he did extraordinarily well. And he had the world
4:46
Speaker 3: at his fingertips. People were lining up to have him
4:48
Speaker 3: as the mascot, as it were, and he had advertising
4:52
Speaker 3: contracts lined up, and it was a remarkable world. And
4:58
Speaker 3: he had every woman in the world as long as
5:02
Speaker 3: they were pretty and blonde, who were chasing after him.
5:07
Speaker 3: And they were there. Then what happened was that he'd
5:13
Speaker 3: been going out with, strangely enough, I have a different
5:16
Speaker 3: context with it. He'd been going out with a young
5:18
Speaker 3: woman whose mother I taught at school. I was a
5:22
Speaker 3: teacher at one stage, and I taught this woman at school,
5:25
Speaker 3: and her daughter was the girlfriend before Riva Stierenkamp. I
5:31
Speaker 3: took statements from that daughter at the time for my book,
5:37
Speaker 3: and he was really a little bit out of hand.
5:42
Speaker 3: He used to abuse alcohol a bit, and he got
5:45
Speaker 3: himself totally drunk one night and lit a fire in
5:48
Speaker 3: their flat on the floor and then poured alcohol onto
5:53
Speaker 3: it and then slipped on that. And this young woman
5:56
Speaker 3: was so nervous for her life that she went and
5:58
Speaker 3: hid his pistol away. Anyway, he had a second interest
6:02
Speaker 3: apart from running. Namely, he was quite interested in firearms.
6:09
Speaker 3: Not from a firearm point of view, but from a
6:11
Speaker 3: macho point of view. He went for the automatic weapons,
6:15
Speaker 3: and he had a 9.0 Parabellum, and he had applications
6:20
Speaker 3: in for bigger and better and stronger and faster and
6:24
Speaker 3: heavier weapons, which were all in process. And he would
6:28
Speaker 3: have got them because of his celebrity status. Anyway, the
6:31
Speaker 3: long and the short of it was that he broke
6:34
Speaker 3: up with the woman that I know. And he took
6:40
Speaker 3: up with Reva's income shortly before this unfortunate incident occurred.
6:45
Speaker 3: And I'm not sure that Oscar was, there were certainly
6:50
Speaker 3: rumors and allegations of infidelity. And I think that Reva
6:54
Speaker 3: might have been a little unhappy with this infidelity. that
6:59
Speaker 3: was being alleged, and he was certainly still talking to
7:05
Speaker 3: previous girlfriends at the time of the terrible incident, and
7:12
Speaker 3: I think she came upon him when he was talking
7:15
Speaker 3: to one of these erstwhile liaisons. Anyway, the long and
7:22
Speaker 3: the short of it was that there was a shooting
7:26
Speaker 3: that happened, and I'll go into the details of that
7:30
Speaker 3: in a minute, but the shooting that Oscar thought his
7:36
Speaker 3: version in court was that he thought that he was
7:38
Speaker 3: shooting an intruder and he feared for his life. He
7:43
Speaker 3: fired four shots into a bathroom, a toilet area, which
7:48
Speaker 3: was a locked toilet area, in which he thought the
7:51
Speaker 3: intruder was hiding. there are many things that one needs
7:57
Speaker 3: to look here. So look at here. So what I
8:00
Speaker 3: will do is I'll give you the facts and I
8:02
Speaker 3: will draw you, your listeners may draw their own conclusions. The, uh,
8:08
Speaker 3: they shared a double bed. Hang on.
8:10
Speaker 2: When was this? So let's just quickly get the, the,
8:12
Speaker 2: the timing right. Also, this was Valentine's day, 20, um, 2012.
8:16
Speaker 3: Was it? 14th of February. Uh, I think 2013.
8:26
Speaker 4: 2013.
8:26
Speaker 3: Okay. And he had a luxury estate near Pretoria, and
8:33
Speaker 3: he shared a double bed with Riva. And that became
8:39
Speaker 3: important as well because there were curtains, of course, and
8:44
Speaker 3: he claims he heard a noise in the night and
8:47
Speaker 3: he thought there was an intruder. And he took his pistol,
8:50
Speaker 3: which was clearly at the side of the bed, and
8:52
Speaker 3: he must have cocked it or he must have had
8:56
Speaker 3: a bullet in the chamber. And he went down the
9:02
Speaker 3: corridor from the bedroom. There was a narrow corridor from
9:05
Speaker 3: the bedroom. And there was a bathroom at the end
9:09
Speaker 3: of that corridor, which had no door to the bathroom.
9:12
Speaker 3: It was the bathroom and shower area. and inside the
9:16
Speaker 3: bathroom was a lockable toilet cubicle. And he went to
9:22
Speaker 3: the door of the thing, and he apparently believed that
9:26
Speaker 3: there was somebody inside the cubicle, and shots were fired. Now,
9:32
Speaker 3: the subsequent unfolding of the story is an amazing chapter
9:37
Speaker 3: of errors on the part of the South African police force.
9:42
Speaker 3: And Had the police force wanted to write the textbook
9:50
Speaker 3: on how not to do an investigation, this was their
9:54
Speaker 3: golden opportunity and they took full advantage of it. What
9:58
Speaker 3: happened was that after the shooting, the neighbors came rushing over,
10:07
Speaker 3: and they found Oscar Pistorius crouched by the side of Reva,
10:12
Speaker 3: who was either dead or dying at the bottom of
10:14
Speaker 3: the stairs. He'd carried her down the stairs from the bathrooms.
10:19
Speaker 3: And she was at the bottom of the stairs, and
10:21
Speaker 3: police were then called, and Oscar was arrested. But in
10:26
Speaker 3: the interim, there was a to-ing and a fro-ing over
10:31
Speaker 3: the crime scene. Now, it's important to understand, how did
10:35
Speaker 3: I get involved in this? Because I've been doing crime
10:38
Speaker 3: scenes for the last 43 years. And at that stage,
10:42
Speaker 3: this was, what, 2013? It's about 2013. about 14 years ago.
10:48
Speaker 3: I'd been doing it for 30 years. And I knew
10:52
Speaker 3: something about how you treat a crime scene because minute evidence,
10:57
Speaker 3: trace evidence is extremely important in proving your case. And
11:01
Speaker 3: blood spatter and blood stains and fingerprints and, and, and,
11:06
Speaker 3: and are all vitally important. So you don't want a
11:09
Speaker 3: public jamboree on your crime scene. And clearly, This was
11:16
Speaker 3: why I was asked by one of the American news stations.
11:21
Speaker 3: I can't remember which one it was. It might have
11:24
Speaker 3: been CNN, one of those. I can't remember. But I
11:27
Speaker 3: was asked to keep a watching brief on the trial
11:29
Speaker 3: and comment on it. Now, the first thing, as I say,
11:32
Speaker 3: that happened was that there was a coming and going
11:35
Speaker 3: and a to-ing and fro-ing on that crime scene to
11:37
Speaker 3: the extent where Oscar claimed that his valuable watch collection
11:41
Speaker 3: had been stolen. So that gives you some idea of
11:44
Speaker 3: the lack of control because normally what you do on
11:47
Speaker 3: a crime scene is you seal it off. It becomes
11:50
Speaker 3: hermetically sealed. And as a result of that, you put
11:55
Speaker 3: barrier tape up and nobody crosses that barrier tape. There's
11:58
Speaker 3: normally a scene of crime officer and an entrance and
12:03
Speaker 3: exit officer who records and makes absolutely certain that nobody,
12:09
Speaker 3: but nobody goes onto that scene unless they have a
12:12
Speaker 3: purpose there. And that person is timed in and timed
12:16
Speaker 3: out and the purpose is recorded. None of that happened. So,
12:21
Speaker 3: lots of people and lots of damage to the scene
12:23
Speaker 3: was done, which was the case. Anyway, Oscar was arrested
12:31
Speaker 3: and spent some time in the cells, and he was
12:36
Speaker 3: charged with a very serious offense, which required a bail
12:41
Speaker 3: application to be made in such a way that he
12:45
Speaker 3: could get out at least and be outside on bail
12:48
Speaker 3: for the time of the trial. Otherwise, He would have
12:50
Speaker 3: spent his time in jail. I can't remember. It was
12:52
Speaker 3: a Schedule 6 offense that they charged him with. Now,
12:58
Speaker 3: that involved Oscar in making a full statement under oath
13:05
Speaker 3: to the court. And it's vitally important to understand that
13:11
Speaker 3: in the hurly-burly of what's happened to you, you may
13:15
Speaker 3: forget and you may not remember accurately what exactly happened.
13:18
Speaker 3: So it's unwise to make a full statement under oath
13:23
Speaker 3: about the goings-on that night because, as I say, it
13:27
Speaker 3: might turn out to be inaccurate.
13:28
Speaker 2: Can I just quickly jump in for a moment, David,
13:31
Speaker 2: and just point out something that you perhaps have forgotten?
13:34
Speaker 2: He does have, sorry, he did have a history of
13:39
Speaker 2: shooting guns off in public.
13:42
Speaker 3: I'm going to get to that in a minute because
13:45
Speaker 3: that comes later because that was evidence that was led
13:48
Speaker 3: by Gerinel at the trial. Gerinel prosecuted him, by the way. Gerinel,
13:56
Speaker 3: by the way, was involved in the prosecution of Jackie Celebi,
14:01
Speaker 3: who was the former police commissioner.
14:03
Speaker 2: And former head of Interpol.
14:05
Speaker 3: And former head of Interpol. That's correct. How embarrassing can
14:08
Speaker 3: I get to have Jackie Celebi as the head of Interpol? Anyway,
14:12
Speaker 3: the long and the short of that was that a
14:16
Speaker 3: statement was made under oath before a magistrate. So there
14:21
Speaker 3: was no getting away from that statement, whatever was wrong
14:24
Speaker 3: with it. Now, at the trial, it was raised that
14:31
Speaker 3: he was highly irresponsible with guns. He used to carry
14:34
Speaker 3: a gun all the time, a pistol. And on a
14:40
Speaker 3: trip home from the Val, he fired shots in the
14:43
Speaker 3: air and generally misbehaved with a gun. And also he
14:47
Speaker 3: was at Tasha's restaurant in Melrose Arch when somebody showed
14:53
Speaker 3: him a new Glock pistol. And he wanted to have
14:57
Speaker 3: a look at the Glock and he looked at it
14:58
Speaker 3: under the table, put it under the table. So what
15:01
Speaker 3: he did was he pulled back the slide. and ejected
15:06
Speaker 3: the cartridge that was in the chamber and then let
15:09
Speaker 3: the slide go again, not realizing that unless you take
15:13
Speaker 3: the magazine out, you will then simply reload another round
15:17
Speaker 3: into the chamber. And he pulled the trigger and the
15:19
Speaker 3: gun went off in Tasha's restaurant. And he's very lucky
15:22
Speaker 3: indeed that nobody was injured. So he shot into the ground?
15:29
Speaker 3: Shot into the ground under the table, yeah. I think
15:31
Speaker 3: somebody got a splinter in the leg and didn't. press
15:33
Speaker 3: charges any further. But as I said to you, I
15:37
Speaker 3: spoke to, I took a statement from his former girlfriend
15:41
Speaker 3: who told me that he was very reckless with firearms
15:44
Speaker 3: and she feared for her life in one instance where
15:49
Speaker 3: he set fire to some material in the middle of
15:52
Speaker 3: his flat when he was drunk, poured alcohol on it
15:55
Speaker 3: and then slipped and fell and she went and hid
15:58
Speaker 3: his firearm, she was so nervous. And the net result
16:02
Speaker 3: of that was that he passed out happily and didn't
16:04
Speaker 3: do her any harm. But she fortunately left him before
16:08
Speaker 3: this all happened. Anyway, that night he heard the noise,
16:14
Speaker 3: which he thought and alleged was an intruder. And he
16:20
Speaker 3: went down to the bathroom without his prostheses on. And
16:27
Speaker 3: his version was that he stood in the door of
16:30
Speaker 3: the bathroom and he could see into the bathroom from
16:37
Speaker 3: there and he alleged he heard the intruder in the
16:40
Speaker 3: toilet area. Right. Now, if he was frightened for his life,
16:48
Speaker 3: he was at that stage not in any immediate danger.
16:53
Speaker 3: If you stand four or five meters away, if you're
16:56
Speaker 3: armed and you stand four or five meters away from
16:59
Speaker 3: a locked door in which you think there's an intruder
17:01
Speaker 3: on the other side, you're pretty safe until that intruder
17:04
Speaker 3: starts coming out. And it was always open to Oscar
17:08
Speaker 3: to call out to the person, who are you? What
17:11
Speaker 3: are you doing there? And if you come out, I'm
17:15
Speaker 3: armed and I will shoot you if you come out.
17:18
Speaker 3: So stay where you are while we call the police.
17:21
Speaker 3: That was never done. Oscar then went closer to the
17:27
Speaker 3: toilet because the evidence from the toilet door was that
17:31
Speaker 3: shots were fired from within about a meter, meter and
17:34
Speaker 3: a half into the toilet, four shots. And the shots
17:38
Speaker 3: were fired from a 9mm Parabellum, which is standard. It's
17:42
Speaker 3: a standard police issue weapon. It's a powerful weapon. They
17:46
Speaker 3: are more powerful, but the weapon was loaded with what
17:49
Speaker 3: I call black talon bullets. Oh. And a black talon
17:54
Speaker 3: bullet is an expanding bullet. It's got a nose which
17:58
Speaker 3: is hollow, and it's got petal-shaped. The outer casing is petal-shaped.
18:06
Speaker 3: And when it hits a target, the petals open out.
18:10
Speaker 3: They spread like petals of a flower. And remember that
18:13
Speaker 3: that bullet is turning, so you've got a kind of
18:16
Speaker 3: meat grinder effect as the bullet goes through the tissue.
18:19
Speaker 3: It makes a very surgically challenging wound. But it also
18:24
Speaker 3: does something else. It deposits all the energy of the
18:30
Speaker 3: explosion and the force driving that bullet. It deposits it
18:35
Speaker 3: in the body. So it makes, as I said, a
18:37
Speaker 3: very challenging thing if somebody survives and you've got to
18:40
Speaker 3: do surgery on it. And it doesn't go through the body.
18:46
Speaker 3: It stays in the body. And that's the whole purpose
18:49
Speaker 3: of those that, you know, if you're in a life-threatening
18:51
Speaker 3: situation in a crowd, you want to shoot the perpetrator,
18:54
Speaker 3: you don't want to shoot the little old lady doing
18:56
Speaker 3: her knitting in the seat next door. So you have
19:00
Speaker 3: that kind of ammunition, which is perfectly standard for self-defense weapons.
19:04
Speaker 3: And it hit her in the leg, in the hip,
19:09
Speaker 3: and one shot missed, and the other shots, the jacket
19:17
Speaker 3: went one way, and the casing went the other way,
19:21
Speaker 3: and that was the shot that hit her in the
19:24
Speaker 3: head and killed her. So she was sitting against the
19:29
Speaker 3: door with her back against the door. I don't know
19:33
Speaker 3: whether she was, but her hand, one of them went
19:36
Speaker 3: through her hand. But the long and the short of
19:40
Speaker 3: that was that she collapsed in the toilet and shots
19:44
Speaker 3: were fired after she'd collapsed. And you could see that
19:49
Speaker 3: from an analysis of the blood spatter in the toilet
19:52
Speaker 3: itself and on the wall behind the toilet. Now, the
19:59
Speaker 3: police investigation was so good, they failed to find a
20:02
Speaker 3: bullet in the bottom of the toilet bowl. And that
20:06
Speaker 3: was the level of incompetence that you had. And not
20:10
Speaker 3: only that, the police officer who did the investigation, who
20:14
Speaker 3: was the first police officer on the scene, stomped around
20:17
Speaker 3: in his hobnail boots all over the crime scene, destroying
20:21
Speaker 3: evidence and not protecting the evidence whatsoever. It was the
20:26
Speaker 3: height of incompetence. Anyway, as I said, he subsequently made
20:31
Speaker 3: the statement to the magistrate to get out of prison.
20:35
Speaker 3: and on bail to get bail, and that was done.
20:38
Speaker 3: And he had as his defense counsel the formidable Barry Rue.
20:43
Speaker 3: Barry is a really fine criminal advocate. And Barry defended him.
20:49
Speaker 3: And that itself, and I'll allude to that later, that
20:53
Speaker 3: defense and the cross-examination by Harry Nell had long-ranging consequences
21:02
Speaker 3: in criminal justice. activities in South Africa subsequently. The defense
21:06
Speaker 3: was whether he intended to kill her or not.
21:08
Speaker 4: Okay.
21:10
Speaker 3: Now, there's a number of legal issues which come up,
21:16
Speaker 3: and I see that there's divided opinion. Chris Marnovic, who's
21:19
Speaker 3: a very senior advocate who's retired now and living in Australia,
21:23
Speaker 3: has written recently to suggest that Oscar should not have
21:28
Speaker 3: been convicted of murder the way he was. Now, your
21:31
Speaker 3: listeners need to understand that to be convicted of a crime,
21:34
Speaker 3: you need to have what is known as mens rea,
21:37
Speaker 3: the guilty mind. So if you hand a bottle of
21:44
Speaker 3: Coke that you bought in a shop to somebody and
21:46
Speaker 3: that Coke happens to be laced with poison, it's not
21:50
Speaker 3: your fault if they die. But if you knew it
21:53
Speaker 3: was laced with poison and you gave it to somebody
21:56
Speaker 3: to drink, then you've got the guilty mind. Or if
21:59
Speaker 3: you thought there was a good chance that it might
22:01
Speaker 3: have been laced with poison, you also can be guilty
22:05
Speaker 3: of another kind of mens rea. And there are two
22:09
Speaker 3: kinds of mens rea. There's so-called dolus and there's so-called culpa.
22:14
Speaker 3: And if you're negligent in your behavior, so if you
22:19
Speaker 3: drive your car down the road drunk and you are
22:22
Speaker 3: negligent and you accidentally lose control and swerve off and
22:27
Speaker 3: you kill somebody, you didn't sit out driving to kill
22:31
Speaker 3: that person, but your negligence resulted in their death and
22:35
Speaker 3: that is what is known as culpable homicide. And that
22:38
Speaker 3: is culpa. But if on the other hand you go
22:42
Speaker 3: into a room and you get annoyed with someone and
22:45
Speaker 3: you put out a pistol or a knife and you
22:47
Speaker 3: shoot them, okay, that is called dolus. And you can
22:52
Speaker 3: get two kinds of dolus. There's called dolus directus, which
22:56
Speaker 3: is where I get annoyed with you, German, I come
22:58
Speaker 3: down to your house and I shoot you, meaning to
23:02
Speaker 3: shoot you. And there's dolus eventualis, where your behavior is
23:06
Speaker 3: so reckless that that you could have foreseen the death
23:10
Speaker 3: of somebody and yet you carried on. So if you
23:12
Speaker 3: go into a crowded pub and you pull out your
23:15
Speaker 3: pistol and fire it into the roof and a ricochet
23:18
Speaker 3: hits and kills somebody, that is called dolus eventualis. So
23:22
Speaker 3: if your behavior is so reckless that you could have
23:25
Speaker 3: foreseen the outcome and the possibility that somebody could die,
23:30
Speaker 3: that is called dolus eventualis. And it carries with this
23:34
Speaker 3: significant jail sentence. a much more serious jail sentence than
23:40
Speaker 3: culpable homicide. Now, let's examine that. Let's examine a number
23:46
Speaker 3: of things that happened in that particular trial which are
23:49
Speaker 3: of interest and your viewers can make up their own mind. Firstly,
23:54
Speaker 3: if I were to hear a noise in the bed
23:58
Speaker 3: that I share with my wife and I get up
24:01
Speaker 3: to go and investigate, number one, I know when my
24:05
Speaker 3: wife's in the same bed. Okay, there's no question about
24:09
Speaker 3: it that you know that the person is there. And
24:14
Speaker 3: even in limited light, you can tell that there's somebody there.
24:20
Speaker 3: You can maybe hear their breathing or their movement, or
24:23
Speaker 3: as you get out of bed, you can sense that
24:26
Speaker 3: they're there.
24:26
Speaker 2: But David, sorry, but I mean, in reality, nobody sleeps
24:31
Speaker 2: in a room that is so dark that you cannot
24:33
Speaker 2: see the person next to you.
24:35
Speaker 3: Well, that was never established. Never accurately and adequately established
24:40
Speaker 3: the level of light in the room. But he then
24:43
Speaker 3: went down to the opening in the un-doored. It's just
24:48
Speaker 3: a gap in the wall where you can walk into
24:50
Speaker 3: the bathroom. And through that gap, you can get into
24:53
Speaker 3: the wider bathroom. And you can then, as I say,
24:57
Speaker 3: in the far corner on the left-hand side, there was
25:01
Speaker 3: a toilet cubicle which had a lockable door for privacy. Now,
25:07
Speaker 3: if you are in such danger that you are feared
25:14
Speaker 3: for your life, then you would stand at that opening
25:18
Speaker 3: in the door. And as I said earlier, you would
25:20
Speaker 3: call out and say, I'm armed, come out at your peril.
25:25
Speaker 3: And if you come out, I'm going to shoot you.
25:27
Speaker 3: And of course, he was more vulnerable than most because
25:31
Speaker 3: of his disability. And one would have expected him to
25:36
Speaker 3: stay there. a little further away from danger, but he didn't.
25:39
Speaker 3: He approached the danger, and he then fired shots into
25:44
Speaker 3: the door, and he must have realized after the fourth shot,
25:48
Speaker 3: and you can fire off four shots of an automatic
25:50
Speaker 3: pistol in the time it takes for me to tell
25:53
Speaker 3: you this, and quicker, actually. You can empty a 9.0
25:56
Speaker 3: magazine in two, three seconds if you pull the trigger quickly,
26:01
Speaker 3: and if it doesn't jam. But four shots went in. Now, anybody...
26:07
Speaker 3: who knows anything about firearms possession will know that in
26:12
Speaker 3: order to get a firearm, you've got to undergo training,
26:15
Speaker 3: number one, and number two, you've got to pass a
26:18
Speaker 3: competency test. And in that competency test, you have to
26:23
Speaker 3: be able to answer certain questions and you have to
26:25
Speaker 3: understand the elements of the law pertaining to firearms and
26:29
Speaker 3: pertaining to when you may or may not use a firearm.
26:35
Speaker 3: And you're Criterion for using the firearm has to be
26:42
Speaker 3: that your life is in immediate imminent danger. And it
26:49
Speaker 3: has to be that, or somebody else's life must be
26:51
Speaker 3: in imminent danger. So if you see somebody with a
26:56
Speaker 3: knife about to stab your wife, you're entitled to shoot them.
26:59
Speaker 3: And that, in regard, is justifiable homicide. So, I mean,
27:03
Speaker 3: I can confirm what you're saying.
27:04
Speaker 2: I've also got my competency, and I can tell you
27:07
Speaker 2: that one of the questions they ask you is exactly
27:11
Speaker 2: what you just laid out. If somebody's in your house
27:14
Speaker 2: and their back is facing you, you're not actually allowed
27:17
Speaker 2: to shoot them.
27:17
Speaker 1: Right.
27:19
Speaker 3: And even if somebody breaks into your house through the
27:23
Speaker 3: front door, you're not allowed to shoot them before they
27:27
Speaker 3: actually get into your house and start approaching you. It's
27:30
Speaker 3: a crazy law in that if that person is armed,
27:34
Speaker 3: it gives the advantage to your intruder and not to
27:37
Speaker 3: the person who is being attacked. But that's the way
27:41
Speaker 3: our law is, and that's the way the woke and
27:46
Speaker 3: liberal law have designed our laws these days. So you've
27:50
Speaker 3: got to give the advantage to the person on the
27:54
Speaker 3: other side, your intruder or your attacker, before you're allowed
27:57
Speaker 3: to pull out your weapon and shoot them. So from
28:01
Speaker 3: that point of view, I think the law is a
28:03
Speaker 3: little misguided. But he certainly was not, and he certainly
28:07
Speaker 3: approached the danger. Once he'd fired the shots, he must
28:11
Speaker 3: have realized that it was not an intruder inside there.
28:15
Speaker 3: because he then tried to open the door, which was locked.
28:19
Speaker 3: And that, I think, is important as well. They were
28:23
Speaker 3: an intimate couple. If she'd gone to the loo in
28:26
Speaker 3: the middle of the night, why would she lock the door?
28:29
Speaker 2: Okay?
28:32
Speaker 3: Oscar then fetched a cricket bat, and he then battered
28:36
Speaker 3: down the door and took Reva out of the battered door.
28:41
Speaker 3: He opened the door and took her out, and carried
28:43
Speaker 3: her downstairs where he was later found sobbing in a
28:47
Speaker 3: pile next to the dying or dead reaver at the
28:50
Speaker 3: bottom of the staircase. Now, the question arises is this,
28:56
Speaker 3: is that he thought it was an intruder. Let's assume
29:01
Speaker 3: on the high point of his defense that there was
29:04
Speaker 3: an intruder in the bathroom. If you fire a nine
29:09
Speaker 3: mil parabellum into a closed space where another human being is,
29:14
Speaker 3: you have to foresee the consequences that you may kill them.
29:20
Speaker 3: A nine mil is not a toy. And firing four shots,
29:25
Speaker 3: one shot, you must foresee the chance that you will
29:27
Speaker 3: kill somebody on the other side. Firing four shots, that
29:32
Speaker 3: chance of killing them becomes a near certainty. particularly in
29:37
Speaker 3: a small area, as I said, like a toilet cubicle.
29:42
Speaker 3: The bashing down of the door becomes quite important in
29:49
Speaker 3: this debate because the neighbors were called who heard shots.
29:55
Speaker 3: They claimed that they heard screaming and then shots. And
30:02
Speaker 3: Barry very skillfully cross-examined them, and they did acoustics testing.
30:08
Speaker 3: And it's quite strange to understand that the sound of
30:13
Speaker 3: a cricket bat being bashed against a door when heard
30:18
Speaker 3: from a distance sounds remarkably like gunshots. And Barry was
30:25
Speaker 3: able to create enough doubt in that to say that
30:29
Speaker 3: it was the cricket bat against the door which preceded
30:33
Speaker 3: the gunshots. And the neighbors were a little bit at
30:37
Speaker 3: odds with their versions. And the net result of all
30:42
Speaker 3: of that was that Barry got the notion and crossed
30:45
Speaker 3: enough doubt to say that the screaming was Oscar screaming
30:49
Speaker 3: when he realized what he's done. And generally, when you
30:54
Speaker 3: scream in terror like that, your voice goes up a
30:57
Speaker 3: pitch or two. And there were many issues that were raised,
31:01
Speaker 3: such as if you had neighbors who were sleeping, they
31:06
Speaker 3: may not have woken up at the first shot. You
31:10
Speaker 3: wake up gradually, necessarily. I mean, you hear a shot,
31:13
Speaker 3: you won't immediately wake up and get out of bed,
31:16
Speaker 3: particularly if you're some distance away, a couple of hundred
31:19
Speaker 3: meters away. And the nature of that sound is altered
31:24
Speaker 3: by passing through buildings and passing across an open space.
31:29
Speaker 3: So it becomes very difficult to say whether it was
31:32
Speaker 3: gunshots or the cricket bat that caused the neighbors to
31:35
Speaker 3: become aware. But they came rushing over very quickly. I
31:42
Speaker 3: was asked to become involved by Barry at one stage,
31:45
Speaker 3: but I declined because there was no money to cover
31:49
Speaker 3: my fees and I was unable and unwilling to. to
31:54
Speaker 3: act on contingency and on the possibility that I might
31:58
Speaker 3: get a fee. So I really wasn't interested in getting
32:01
Speaker 3: involved in that particular case because it could have been
32:04
Speaker 3: a time-consuming and eventful case for somebody in my position.
32:11
Speaker 3: But he did, Barry did manage to get hold of,
32:14
Speaker 3: and I put him on to a very good acoustics
32:19
Speaker 3: engineer called Terry McKenzie Hoye. And Terry did work for
32:25
Speaker 3: the case and did some very useful work for the
32:30
Speaker 3: case relating to the nature of the sound that was
32:34
Speaker 3: heard and the nature of the transmission of that sound.
32:38
Speaker 3: But the end of that whole result was that the
32:42
Speaker 3: judge in that instance, who was a self-disabled person, found Oscar,
32:50
Speaker 3: when she summed up, I listened to her summing up,
32:54
Speaker 3: and I thought, she's summing up towards dolus eventualis. She's
32:57
Speaker 3: going to find him guilty of dolus eventualis. And it
33:00
Speaker 3: was with absolute amazing surprise that she found him guilty
33:07
Speaker 3: of a lesser charge. And that resulted in itself a
33:13
Speaker 3: piece of very interesting legal history, because generally speaking, Once
33:18
Speaker 3: you've been tried and found on the lesser charge, it's
33:22
Speaker 3: seldom that the state can go back and reopen the
33:24
Speaker 3: case and go on appeal on that, and they seldom
33:27
Speaker 3: do it. It happens very seldom. Normally, you're only allowed
33:33
Speaker 3: to go back on the case and appeal on questions
33:38
Speaker 3: where the judge got it wrong in law. So, That's
33:42
Speaker 3: what happened. Gerinal prepared a new case, and Oscar was
33:45
Speaker 3: dragged back to court, and the whole procedure went on again,
33:50
Speaker 3: and the appeal court came to the conclusion that the
33:55
Speaker 3: initial sentence was wrong and increased the sentence. I think
33:59
Speaker 3: it was seven. I can't remember how many years it was.
34:02
Speaker 3: I've forgotten. It's a long time ago now. So they
34:05
Speaker 3: increased the sentence, and Oscar went to prison for that
34:08
Speaker 3: period of time. He got time off, obviously, for good behavior.
34:13
Speaker 3: And I'm sure he bolstered the prison athletics team quite well.
34:19
Speaker 3: But generally speaking, that's what happened in the case. And
34:24
Speaker 3: it's now still a matter of concern as to whether
34:27
Speaker 3: the judgments were right or wrong. And my view is
34:33
Speaker 3: that if you have that set of circumstances, you must foresee.
34:41
Speaker 3: the possibility that the person on the other side will die. Now,
34:44
Speaker 3: let's take the other issue that came up.
34:49
Speaker 2: He woke up, he heard a noise, and I'm guessing hobbled.
34:54
Speaker 2: I don't think he would have had his blades on
34:56
Speaker 2: in bed.
34:56
Speaker 3: No, he didn't have his blades on.
34:58
Speaker 2: So he would have hobbled to the bathroom and then
35:02
Speaker 2: shot through the door.
35:03
Speaker 3: Now, in reality... Here's what I think.
35:08
Speaker 2: They had an argument and she ran to the bathroom,
35:11
Speaker 2: perhaps to phone a friend because she had a cell
35:13
Speaker 2: phone with her to say, come and fetch me. Who
35:16
Speaker 2: knows what they said. He went all the way to
35:18
Speaker 2: the bathroom and shot, knowing that she was in there,
35:23
Speaker 2: maybe in rage, not necessarily in that moment thinking to
35:28
Speaker 2: kill her, but just because he had lost his mind.
35:31
Speaker 2: You know, like if somebody cuts you off in the
35:32
Speaker 2: traffic and you just in an instant, It was.
35:37
Speaker 3: A bathroom version of road rage.
35:40
Speaker 2: Yeah. In my view, that's most likely what happened. And
35:46
Speaker 2: I think everybody probably thinks the same.
35:50
Speaker 3: Well, I think that that is a general view of
35:54
Speaker 3: the situation. And it says a great deal for Barry
35:59
Speaker 3: that he was able to put a less likely situation
36:02
Speaker 3: to the court and have it accepted. And also, the
36:05
Speaker 3: other thing was quite interesting to me, was that the
36:10
Speaker 3: Gerinel attracted a great deal of adverse criticism about his
36:14
Speaker 3: conduct of the trial. I mean, what he did was
36:19
Speaker 3: he forced Oscar to look at certain photographs and had
36:24
Speaker 3: Oscar vomiting in the witness box and collapsing and the
36:28
Speaker 3: court had to be stood down while he recovered his composure. So,
36:34
Speaker 3: Harry's ultra aggressive treatment of the cross-examination, as I said,
36:40
Speaker 3: drew a lot of criticism, both in South Africa and internationally.
36:44
Speaker 3: And I've always said you catch, the best cross-examination is
36:52
Speaker 3: subtle cross-examination, where you can catch more flies with a
36:58
Speaker 3: teaspoon full of honey than you will with a barrel
37:01
Speaker 3: full of vinegar. Subtle cross-examination, directed cross-examination, that bruising, aggressive
37:10
Speaker 3: cross-examination is not good cross-examination. Now, that has had some
37:16
Speaker 3: unfortunate consequences because that trial was broadcast worldwide. And recently,
37:23
Speaker 3: I'm aware of a situation where a senior police officer
37:27
Speaker 3: tried hard to get an expert from an American legal
37:33
Speaker 3: system I can't remember if it was the FBI or
37:37
Speaker 3: one of the other law enforcement agencies in America to
37:41
Speaker 3: come out and assist him in a matter in this country.
37:45
Speaker 3: It was quite a complex matter. And she said, she
37:48
Speaker 3: refused point blank to come out. She said, I'm not
37:51
Speaker 3: prepared to come out and be carried and buried in
37:56
Speaker 3: a court in your country. I'm not prepared to put
37:58
Speaker 3: up with that sort of nonsense. And I can tell
38:01
Speaker 3: you from personal experience, the prosecution, in South Africa, their
38:06
Speaker 3: idea of cross-examination is to examine crossly. And it's not good.
38:11
Speaker 3: It's not good cross-examination. In the last few years, I
38:15
Speaker 3: gave evidence in a matter, a murder case in Franschhoek,
38:19
Speaker 3: where the case was heard in Paul. I gave evidence
38:25
Speaker 3: in this matter, where the prosecutor spent the first day
38:30
Speaker 3: insulting me and being rude to me and behaving in
38:34
Speaker 3: a most irresponsible and inaccurate way just to get you
38:38
Speaker 3: riled up. And the secret, of course, in giving evidence
38:42
Speaker 3: is not to get riled up because when you lose
38:44
Speaker 3: your temper, The other person who's cross-examined you has got you.
38:49
Speaker 3: George Bezos said, if I can make them lose their temper,
38:52
Speaker 3: I own them. Yes. And he's right.
38:54
Speaker 2: So just to add to what you said now, you
38:55
Speaker 2: said it was televised globally. It is widely considered one
38:58
Speaker 2: of the most televised court cases. It's far away from O.J. Simpson,
39:03
Speaker 2: but it's still up there.
39:06
Speaker 3: Yeah. No, no, it is. As I said to you,
39:09
Speaker 3: it has reached the narrow confines of this little one-horse
39:13
Speaker 3: town that I live in, in the middle of the
39:16
Speaker 3: countryside in England. And everybody knows about it. It's the
39:20
Speaker 3: first thing they want to ask you about. So that's
39:24
Speaker 3: the story of Oscar Pistorius. And the next question, of course,
39:28
Speaker 3: is could he have not been aware that Reva was there?
39:31
Speaker 3: And why did he not call out? You know, I mean,
39:35
Speaker 3: if I hear a noise, you know, I make sure
39:38
Speaker 3: that my wife's there and that she's not wandering around,
39:42
Speaker 3: that I don't shoot her. I'm not sure if she'd
39:45
Speaker 3: do the same for me.
39:48
Speaker 2: But, I mean, that's the thing, though. I mean, if
39:51
Speaker 2: there's a danger in your home, the first thing you
39:54
Speaker 2: do is check your own family.
39:57
Speaker 3: Yes, you do. And you don't approach the danger. Your
40:03
Speaker 3: time to react becomes the closer you get to the danger. Now,
40:07
Speaker 3: another issue comes up. Let's take the high point of
40:09
Speaker 3: it that he thought it was an intruder behind the door.
40:14
Speaker 3: You're not allowed to shoot that intruder unless he's an
40:17
Speaker 3: immediate danger to you. And if it is an intruder
40:21
Speaker 3: and you make a mistake and shoot Reva, what is
40:24
Speaker 3: known in law as error in persona is not a defense.
40:28
Speaker 3: If you are reckless and you shoot somebody by mistake,
40:30
Speaker 3: that's not a defense. So I'm amazed that the judge
40:38
Speaker 3: gave that judgment. It did not.
40:42
Speaker 2: Well, are you amazed? Is it not possible that there
40:46
Speaker 2: was some corruption going on behind the scenes?
40:49
Speaker 3: No, I don't think so. I don't think there was
40:52
Speaker 3: corruption going on behind the scenes. Not with Barry, and
40:55
Speaker 3: I don't really know who would have done that either.
40:59
Speaker 3: So I don't know where the corruption would have been.
41:03
Speaker 3: What is interesting is whether the fact that you had
41:06
Speaker 3: a disabled judge in judgment on a disabled man, whether
41:11
Speaker 3: that's the right way to go about it. Well, I
41:13
Speaker 3: suppose you could say that she would have sympathy in
41:16
Speaker 3: seeing it through his lens. She would understand.
41:20
Speaker 2: Maybe she was a fan. Maybe she liked him.
41:22
Speaker 3: The vulnerability.
41:24
Speaker 2: Maybe she was starstruck.
41:27
Speaker 3: I doubt it. I doubt that she was starstruck. She
41:29
Speaker 3: didn't seem to be the sort of judge that would
41:31
Speaker 3: hang on a TV watching athletics and rugby and what
41:34
Speaker 3: have you. I don't know. She may have been starstruck,
41:38
Speaker 3: but then who would not have been? Oscar was a
41:42
Speaker 3: legend in his own lifetime. And he threw it all
41:46
Speaker 3: away in that unguarded moment. It was thrown away so
41:49
Speaker 3: wastefully and in an absolutely unguarded moment. Now, there are
41:54
Speaker 3: certainly eminent legal people who are of the view that
41:59
Speaker 3: Masipo was correct and that he shouldn't have been convicted
42:02
Speaker 3: in the way he was. Chris Monawick is one of them,
42:05
Speaker 3: writing in a recent article from Australia, which I haven't got.
42:09
Speaker 3: I'd like to try and get hold of. I must
42:11
Speaker 3: try and contact Chris Monawick, but I don't have his
42:14
Speaker 3: phone number. But what I'll do is, he's written about it,
42:19
Speaker 3: and I'll see if I can get the book. But
42:22
Speaker 3: the other thing about it was that it was never
42:25
Speaker 3: fully examined. The contents of her stomach, they apparently had
42:33
Speaker 3: a late meal. And his evidence was they were in
42:37
Speaker 3: bed early. But it would seem as though there was
42:42
Speaker 3: a late meal. But nobody ever went into the rate
42:46
Speaker 3: of stomach emptying in this particular case. And it's also
42:52
Speaker 3: not a particularly accurate way of deciding when the food
42:57
Speaker 3: was deposited in the stomach. Normally, your stomach is fully
43:00
Speaker 3: emptied after about six hours. But depending on your state
43:05
Speaker 3: of mind and your agitation and your autonomic nervous system,
43:10
Speaker 3: that can slow down. So if you have if you
43:14
Speaker 3: have a fight or flight response, if you're agitated and
43:20
Speaker 3: the autonomic nervous system is slowing down all those things,
43:24
Speaker 3: except the things that you need for running and fighting,
43:27
Speaker 3: the stomach emptying will be much slower. So it's not
43:30
Speaker 3: an accurate way of determining the time of death from
43:36
Speaker 3: the stomach content, but it was never done anyway, so
43:38
Speaker 3: it never came up in the trial. And as I say,
43:44
Speaker 3: The cricket bat story and the noise made by that.
43:50
Speaker 3: The other person that was called in the trial was
43:53
Speaker 3: a fellow by the name of Roger Dickerson. And Roger
43:59
Speaker 3: worked for the police. And he also gave evidence in
44:04
Speaker 3: the trial. But he was so far outside his field
44:07
Speaker 3: of expertise that his evidence really played no role. He
44:12
Speaker 3: subsequently died. And the other person who gave evidence and
44:16
Speaker 3: discovered that he was not as good as he thought
44:18
Speaker 3: he was, was the pathologist who claimed not to see
44:24
Speaker 3: the blood spats in the toilet until he was shown
44:26
Speaker 3: a photograph of it. Now, that's another thing which is
44:29
Speaker 3: quite important. You know, examining a photograph forensically is not
44:35
Speaker 3: like looking at happy snaps, holiday snaps. You've got to
44:39
Speaker 3: look at it very carefully and very precisely. in a
44:43
Speaker 3: detailed way and in a manner which takes everything in.
44:48
Speaker 3: You don't look at it as a whole picture. You
44:50
Speaker 3: look at it as individual parts of the picture. And
44:54
Speaker 3: this particular pathologist said he couldn't see bloodstains on the toilet,
44:57
Speaker 3: which would have indicated that the blood spatter was deposited
45:02
Speaker 3: there after she'd collapsed. And it required one photographic enlargement
45:12
Speaker 3: to show that he was completely wrong. So his evidence
45:17
Speaker 3: was largely disregarded and unhelpful.
45:21
Speaker 2: Where was she hit again?
45:23
Speaker 3: She was hit in the hand and the head and
45:27
Speaker 3: the hip.
45:29
Speaker 2: So the head would have ended it?
45:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think the fatal shot was the head, yeah.
45:37
Speaker 3: It's also, look, you can fire off the shots very quickly,
45:43
Speaker 3: and when you fire a shot, if you don't have
45:47
Speaker 3: hearing protection, you go deaf a little bit for a
45:51
Speaker 3: few seconds afterwards. And it may be that he fired
45:54
Speaker 3: off the shots without hearing her screaming, because if he'd
45:58
Speaker 3: heard her screaming, he would have known immediately it was
46:00
Speaker 3: Reva in the toilet.
46:03
Speaker 2: The bullets went through the door. How thick was that door?
46:07
Speaker 4: The door was not a solid wood door. It was
46:12
Speaker 4: what's called a hollow frame door. So it's got a
46:15
Speaker 4: wooden frame, and it's got a plywood surface on either side,
46:22
Speaker 4: which is glued to the frame, and then there's corrugated
46:26
Speaker 4: cardboard on the inside of the door.
46:28
Speaker 3: So it wouldn't have produced much. It was not a
46:32
Speaker 3: solid wooden door.
46:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, I mean, a bullet can go through that easily.
46:36
Speaker 3: The other thing the police did, by the way, which
46:39
Speaker 3: again shows an inability to understand the scene and crime,
46:42
Speaker 3: they went in and took off the door and took
46:44
Speaker 3: it back to the police forensic laboratory. Now, there's nothing
46:50
Speaker 3: they could do at the police forensic laboratory that they
46:52
Speaker 3: couldn't have done with a door in place. And hanging
46:56
Speaker 3: a door is quite a difficult job. It's not an
47:00
Speaker 3: easy job, particularly if you're not an expert in it.
47:04
Speaker 3: And to take it off, it's very unlikely you'll put
47:06
Speaker 3: it back exactly the same way and fits it exactly
47:10
Speaker 3: the same way. So the question arises whether that played
47:14
Speaker 3: a role. And my view is that had Oscar not
47:20
Speaker 3: made the full statement under oath at the beginning, the
47:25
Speaker 3: conditions would have been slightly different. He would not have been,
47:28
Speaker 3: you know, the defense may have been different. And they
47:32
Speaker 3: could have put the state much more to the onus
47:36
Speaker 3: on the state to prove their case than was the
47:41
Speaker 3: case because they basically proved the case for them. And
47:44
Speaker 3: it was only really legal principles and a few forensic
47:47
Speaker 3: principles which came into play subsequently.
47:50
Speaker 2: What is your opinion?
47:51
Speaker 3: I think that I've got two scenarios. I've got the
47:58
Speaker 3: scenario where there was an intruder And I've got this
48:01
Speaker 3: scenario where they had an all-out flaming row, and in
48:05
Speaker 3: a fit of rage, he followed her. And I think
48:07
Speaker 3: she was going to leave, and I think she went
48:09
Speaker 3: with her phone to the bathroom in order to phone
48:14
Speaker 3: a friend to come and fetch her. Because normally, if
48:17
Speaker 3: you get up in the middle of the night to
48:19
Speaker 3: empty your bladder, you don't normally take your phone to
48:21
Speaker 3: the toilet unless you wish to share it with the nation.
48:24
Speaker 3: And the fact that she was locked in the toilet
48:29
Speaker 3: and that she had a phone with her suggests that
48:31
Speaker 3: she was calling for help. And I think that of
48:34
Speaker 3: the two versions, the versions where they had a flaming
48:38
Speaker 3: row and in a fit of rage, he emptied his
48:40
Speaker 3: pistol into the door is the more likely of the two.
48:45
Speaker 3: But of course, very, very persuasively convinced the judges otherwise.
48:51
Speaker 2: And what makes the whole thing complicated is that there
48:53
Speaker 2: are no witnesses.
48:54
Speaker 3: No. That's one of the things about forensic evidence, which
49:00
Speaker 3: is why it becomes so important. And the forensic evidence
49:03
Speaker 3: led in that case was very slight. I think that
49:06
Speaker 3: there's a lot more that they could have done, and
49:09
Speaker 3: some of it was mismanaged.
49:11
Speaker 2: Well, what more could they have done, in your view?
49:15
Speaker 2: Let me rephrase that. What could they have done better?
49:19
Speaker 5: Well.
49:20
Speaker 3: number one, you would have sealed off the seed. Number two,
49:24
Speaker 3: there would have been adequate blood spatter analysis done, which
49:28
Speaker 3: was not done. The blood spatter carrying her down the
49:32
Speaker 3: stairs and what have you would have indicated. The blood
49:37
Speaker 3: spatter in the bathroom was not adequately done. the acoustics
49:43
Speaker 3: that was done should have been done better. There should
49:47
Speaker 3: have been a lot of effort put into that acoustics.
49:50
Speaker 3: And the witnesses who heard the sounds, they should have
49:54
Speaker 3: done the same experiments at that flat with a nine
49:59
Speaker 3: mil and the people who claim to be witnesses and
50:03
Speaker 3: hearing them and comparing it to the cricket bat using
50:07
Speaker 3: sophisticated sound equipment. That wasn't done. And as I say,
50:13
Speaker 3: disturbing the scene before the defense had a chance to
50:16
Speaker 3: have a look at it is a fundamental error that
50:21
Speaker 3: is done so often that it hardly bears talking about.
50:25
Speaker 3: Our legal system and the British legal system prefer that
50:31
Speaker 3: a guilty man gets acquitted rather than an innocent man
50:34
Speaker 3: gets convicted. But that doesn't happen in South African law.
50:41
Speaker 3: Number one, you're supposed to play on an even playing field.
50:44
Speaker 3: It's never an even playing field with you and the prosecution.
50:49
Speaker 3: Number one, in 43 years of doing criminal work, the
50:55
Speaker 3: police have never ever been in any way accommodating to
51:00
Speaker 3: provide me with evidence. They've made it as difficult as
51:03
Speaker 3: possible for me to get hold of evidence to the
51:07
Speaker 3: extent where they go out of their way to hobble
51:12
Speaker 3: me before I can get to court, which is not
51:16
Speaker 3: something that I've ever done to them. If they need
51:18
Speaker 3: help from me, I give the help. If they don't
51:21
Speaker 3: have a piece of equipment, I lend them the piece
51:23
Speaker 3: of equipment. I'm not there to drive getaway cars for anybody,
51:27
Speaker 3: and not only that, at the end of the day,
51:31
Speaker 3: the fundamental thing that you want is that the truth
51:33
Speaker 3: should come out. Do you think.
51:37
Speaker 2: that the fact it was live streamed had an influence
51:42
Speaker 2: on the outcome. And there's a second part of that question,
51:45
Speaker 2: which I also want you to answer is, should court
51:49
Speaker 2: cases be live streamed?
51:52
Speaker 3: Well, were they playing to an audience is what you
51:54
Speaker 3: ought to ask. That's the question you want to ask.
51:58
Speaker 3: And I suspect that some of the players in there
52:01
Speaker 3: were playing to an audience. Some of the witnesses were
52:05
Speaker 3: playing to an audience. Yeah, but the question is asked.
52:11
Speaker 3: You know, every court case is open to anybody. You
52:15
Speaker 3: can walk down the street and see there's a court
52:17
Speaker 3: case you're entitled to go in, unless the aspects which
52:21
Speaker 3: are held in camera. But the general rule is that
52:27
Speaker 3: anybody of any station can go into a court and
52:31
Speaker 3: listen to and observe the court case from beginning until end.
52:34
Speaker 3: So doing it to a wider audience, I don't know.
52:39
Speaker 3: I don't know whether it affects it or not. The O.J.
52:42
Speaker 3: Simpson trial was certainly a lot of grandstanding going on.
52:45
Speaker 3: You know, if the glove doesn't fit, you must acquit
52:48
Speaker 3: in the O.J. Simpson case. And, of course, he was
52:51
Speaker 3: as guilty as sin. So O.J. Simpson shooting his wife.
53:00
Speaker 2: Okay, so I'm trying to find a way to come
53:03
Speaker 2: in for a landing. What would the moral of the
53:05
Speaker 2: story be or the lesson here, David?
53:09
Speaker 3: Well, the lesson is that you've got to be very
53:12
Speaker 3: careful who owns firearms. And you've got to do some
53:17
Speaker 3: psychological evaluation of them. And with the history that Oscar
53:22
Speaker 3: had of owning firearms, I don't think he was a
53:25
Speaker 3: fit person to own a firearm. He was not mature
53:28
Speaker 3: enough to own a firearm. The second thing is that
53:32
Speaker 3: people need to be appraised of the seriousness of firing
53:38
Speaker 3: off shots. where people may get hurt. You know, I
53:42
Speaker 3: carried a firearm in South Africa for 50 years. Never
53:47
Speaker 3: once do it in anger. Never.
53:49
Speaker 5: Because if you draw it in anger, you've got to
53:52
Speaker 5: be prepared to use it to kill. Because anybody who
53:56
Speaker 5: sees you draw it is entitled to shoot you. And
54:00
Speaker 5: that would be justifiable homicide. So firearms are things that
54:06
Speaker 5: They are there to enable you to avoid a situation
54:09
Speaker 5: or to deal with a situation which cannot be avoided.
54:14
Speaker 5: And my idea of carrying a firearm was that if
54:17
Speaker 5: I could not escape or get out of a dangerous situation,
54:23
Speaker 5: then it was the only time I would contemplate using it.
54:26
Speaker 5: But never, as I said, in 50 years of owning
54:31
Speaker 5: a large collection of firearms, by the way, did I
54:34
Speaker 5: ever draw a firearm in anger.
54:37
Speaker 2: What did you have, just as a matter of interest?
54:39
Speaker 3: Oh, I had 140 weapons. I had a collection for
54:45
Speaker 3: ballistic purposes. Because as I said, the police would never
54:48
Speaker 3: ever assist me in lending me a firearm to test.
54:52
Speaker 3: And in order to test itself, I needed to test
54:56
Speaker 3: a Colt 45. I would need to have that weapon
54:59
Speaker 3: and the kind of ammunition that you got in the
55:01
Speaker 3: Ashley Creelmatter. Ashley Creelmatter was one in which they actually,
55:05
Speaker 3: I did get permission to use the gun. But again,
55:09
Speaker 3: it was an unusual situation and it was the only
55:13
Speaker 3: one I can remember where they allowed me to get
55:15
Speaker 3: access to the weapon.
55:16
Speaker 2: A Colt 45, that's a serious gun.
55:20
Speaker 3: Colt 45, yeah, well, there's lots of them. I mean,
55:22
Speaker 3: there's the Desert Eagle, and there's the Colt 45, and
55:26
Speaker 3: there's the.
55:27
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a lot of recoil on that.
55:29
Speaker 3: There's lots of recoil, and there's a Smith & Wesson,
55:32
Speaker 3: I had a Smith & Wesson. 357 Magnum.
55:36
Speaker 2: Oh, that's very nice.
55:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, a very nice weapon.
55:40
Speaker 2: What was your favorite?
55:43
Speaker 3: You know, the carry gun that I consider to be
55:45
Speaker 3: the most useful gun was a. 22 automatic Beretta.
55:49
Speaker 2: Oh, yes. That's tiny, though.
55:53
Speaker 4: No.
55:54
Speaker 3: Shoot somebody in the face with a Beretta changes the
55:56
Speaker 3: attitude completely.
55:57
Speaker 2: No, of course, of course. But, I mean, that round
56:00
Speaker 2: is quite small.
56:01
Speaker 3: No, it's a lethal round.. 22? Mm-hmm. And again, with shooting,
56:08
Speaker 3: the secret to adequate shooting and to safe shooting from
56:12
Speaker 3: your protection point of view is placement, placement, and placement.
56:16
Speaker 3: So you can shoot a man in the foot with
56:18
Speaker 3: a Colt 45, it will have less effect on his
56:21
Speaker 3: behavior with the adrenaline flowing and what have you than
56:25
Speaker 3: the shooting of somebody in the face or in the
56:29
Speaker 3: chest or in the heart with a smaller weapon. And
56:33
Speaker 3: the smaller weapon... Number one, the ammunition for the bigger
56:37
Speaker 3: weapons is exorbitantly expensive these days. And on the smaller weapons,
56:43
Speaker 3: you can shoot all day for 10 rand. You can
56:48
Speaker 3: fire several boxes of. 22 ammunition until you're bored with it.
56:52
Speaker 3: And you can become proficient at it. And, of course,
56:54
Speaker 3: the proficiency with a weapon is key to your owning
56:58
Speaker 3: it and using it and being entitled to own it
57:01
Speaker 3: and use it safely.
57:03
Speaker 2: A mutual friend of ours, Franz Cronje, I went on
57:07
Speaker 2: a hunt with once upon a time and he jokingly
57:11
Speaker 2: said to me, what you do with a. 22, if
57:15
Speaker 2: you're in a difficult situation, is instead of shooting it,
57:18
Speaker 2: just throw it at the person.
57:22
Speaker 3: France has obviously never seen the outcome of a. 22
57:25
Speaker 3: lethal ammunition. I was busy on a case many years
57:29
Speaker 3: ago trying to do a casebook, a collection of firearm
57:36
Speaker 3: injuries and the nature of them are making an atlas
57:39
Speaker 3: of firearm injuries, which never got finished, but for reasons
57:44
Speaker 3: which needn't detain us now. But the point is that a.
57:49
Speaker 3: 22 is an exception. The Mossad used a. 22. And when,
57:54
Speaker 3: I don't know if you remember, there was a doctor
57:57
Speaker 3: who has made it on the East Rand called Raymond Cobran.
58:03
Speaker 3: The people who killed Raymond Cobran used a. 22. It's
58:08
Speaker 3: a small weapon. It doesn't go through and annoy other
58:11
Speaker 3: people behind the person shooting. And you can shoot very
58:16
Speaker 3: accurately with it. And a Beretta... A Beretta with a
58:21
Speaker 3: magazine full of 9 mil is a very lethal thing
58:24
Speaker 3: to have. And also, you can carry it easily. It
58:27
Speaker 3: doesn't damage your search.
58:29
Speaker 2: David, phone numbers don't really work these days. What is
58:33
Speaker 2: your email address? I assume you don't have a website,
58:35
Speaker 2: so how can you be contacted?
58:38
Speaker 3: The easiest way to get hold of me if you
58:40
Speaker 3: have any questions is– David Klatzer, D-A-V-R-D-K-L-A-T-Z-O-W, 48 at gmail.com.
58:51
Speaker 3: That will get me 24-7. So it's David Klatzer, D-A-V-R-D-K-L-A-T-Z-O-W,
58:59
Speaker 3: all one word, 48. Part of that is numerical48 at gmail.com.
59:06
Speaker 2: As always, I love chatting to you, David. It's always
59:08
Speaker 2: a pleasure. Thank you for joining me in the trenches
59:11
Speaker 3: My pleasure and goodbye to all your listeners