Latest / Drive with John Perlman / AKA Tibz trial continues

Transcript

AKA Tibz trial continues · Drive with John Perlman

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: You're with John Pullman on 702. Let's walk the talk. Right,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: let's head down to Durban, to the court where seven
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: people are standing, trial accused of the murders of Kenan, a.k.a. Forbes,
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: and his friend and a man very prominent in the
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: world of chefing, Tibelo Tibs Mutswane. Now, a lot of
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: time spent on CCTV footage. I watched some sections of it,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and there was quite a debate about about whether the
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: person who was being highlighted in that video is one
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: of the people in the doc if I understood things correctly,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: whether they chose their seat or whether the waitress pointed
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: them to a seat. So it's quite minute. It's very,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: very detailed indeed. And let's get an insight into not
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: just the specifics, but also the overall thrust of the
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: arguments in court. Tabiso Gorba, our EWN colleague, has been
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: listening closely. Tabiso, still on CCTV footage, seemingly all focused
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: on the restaurant. What's emerging?
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Good afternoon, John. We just wrapped up the proceedings for today.
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: So today was the cross-examination of Mr. Rajen Senders. That
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: is the CESS technical detective. That's the officer who provided
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: the evidence, or more than three hours of evidence that
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: he collected that relates to the killing of Kenan, a.k.a.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Forbes and Develetives Nutswane. So today was the cross-examination by
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: the defense lawyers, John, and One of the things that
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: the defense lawyers really, you know, emphasized upon was that Mr.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: Sanders is not, well, they suggested that he wasn't qualified
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: to make the kind of findings that he did. They,
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: you know, they asked him that, does he have any
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: expertise in facial recognition? And Mr. Sanders said no. And
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: they asked him, does he have experience? any expertise in
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: anatomical recognition, to which Mr. Sanders also said no. And Mr.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: Sanders said, you know, he has over about 26 years
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: of experience and he's also a human being. So if
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: he sees someone that looks like someone, then he can
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: make that observation just on his human eye, but also
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: with the 27 years of experience that he has. as
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: a police officer. Now, John, you mentioned something about the restaurant.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: That's the Wish restaurant on Florida Road. This is where
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: Tibbs and AKA were killed outside of that restaurant. And
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: one of the men that was identified by Mr. Sanders
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: on CCTV footage as following, aka around in that restaurant,
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: is accused number five, Michal Senin Demande. Now, the lawyer
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: for accused number five, Michal Senin Demande, tried to dispute
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: the evidence that Mr. Demande was following Mr. Forbes around
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: the restaurant, saying that when he got inside the restaurant,
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: he didn't necessarily want to sit in eye view of Mr. Forbes.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: It was actually the restaurant waitress who said that you
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: can sit here. There was a bit of a discussion, John,
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: a bit of back and forth between the lawyer and
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: the witness, Mr. Rajen Sanders, where Mr. Sanders was saying
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: that Mr. Ndimande came into the restaurant wanting to sit
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: within eye view of Mr. AKA. However, his lawyer saying
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: that It was the waitress who suggested this is where
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: he should sit. So it's, you know, the defense, John,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: just obviously hitting on the qualification of Mr. Sanders, but
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: also trying to poke holes in his testimony.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: Any sense of how long this is going to take
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: and where the focus of the court might be next?
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: Well, we still... I think in my account, John, about
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: 20 state witnesses have testified so far. This is obviously
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: very good form considering that the trial started on the
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: 10th of October. I understand that the state has about
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: 50 or so witnesses, so you're looking at about 30
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: more witnesses to testify. However, some witnesses, John, they don't
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: necessarily spend more than a day in court. Some witnesses,
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: you know, we've had witnesses that testify for about 30
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: minutes and they leave. So it just depends on the
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: kind of evidence that the witnesses will be testifying on.
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: But we do understand there's going to be more witnesses
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: testifying about monies that were paid, allegedly paid to the
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: accused to execute the hits. There's going to be cell
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: phone evidence. to track where the phones of the accused
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: pinged at the time when Mr. A.K.A. Forbes was killed.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: But there's also going to be car tracking evidence. You
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: know that, John, there were at least four getaway cars
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: that have been implicated by the states. So there's going
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: to be tracking evidence of those cars, where they were,
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: how they traveled, and who was maybe traveling in them
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: in the run-up and also in the aftermath of the
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: killing of Forbes and Mr. Motwane.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much to our colleague, Tabisul Gorba, down in court,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: keeping an eye on what's going on there.