Coligny convictions – in-depth reprise raises serious doubts
CAPE TOWN — This thorough, painstaking serial reconstruction of the alleged killing by two white Coligny farmers of a black sunflower-stealing youth in October last year, puts the conviction and their long jail-term sentence in serious doubt. If correct, it questions the competency of the judge, given his reported reasoning and conclusions drawn on the strength of purportedly dodgy forensic evidence, a single dubious witness and the perfunctory assessment of seemingly indisputable cellphone geo-location data. Global pariahs for what was been reported as an ugly, vindictive racist assault and murder saga, the convicted pair are currently in their prison cells awaiting Judge Ronnie Hendricks decision on their application for leave to appeal. This serialised reconstruction raises serious doubt about the interpretation of the post-mortem forensic evidence, the veracity of a single, multi-version witness account and its contradiction by the cellphone tower location data. It's a shining example of probing journalism, carried out by three talented writers with strong credentials. Beyond reasonable doubt, it seems, was not an inviolable principle used here. It's just possible that the jailed pair's consistent story that the youth jumped off the back of their moving bakkie is true. You be the judge. Story courtesy of Politicsweb. – Chris Bateman
Coligny: A murder mystery
By James Myburgh, Rian Malan and Gabriel Crouse
Introduction
In the first article, Rian Malan introduced readers to Bendel Pakisi, an informal sector butcher who claimed to have seem Doorewaard & Schutte repeatedly hurling Moshoeu off the back of their bakkie, inflicting fatal injuries. Pakisi's eye-witness account of this "despicable" racist crime provoked widespread arson and looting, but when the case came to trial he changed critical aspects of his narrative and repeatedly contradicted himself.
In the second, Gabriel Crouse addressed the forensic evidence, said by Hendricks to corroborate Pakisi's horrifying narrative. On closer inspection, this claim turned out to be unsustainable.
Read also: Coligny revisited: Post-mortem evidence suggests judgement of emotion, not rationality
Today, in this third article, we examine the call data from Doorewaard & Schutte's cellphone activity on the morning of Moshoeu's death, and its significance. Anyone who reads crime novels knows that cellphone technology has radically transformed the business of solving crime. It's not just that police can "grab" your calls and listen to your conversations. If you own an advanced smartphone and its geolocation or geo-positioning function is working, they can pinpoint your exact position and trace any journey you have made.
Making calls from an ancient Nokia can land you in trouble too. You say, I was home in bed when the bank was robbed. Police say, sorry lad, your phone records show you were ten miles away, making and receiving calls that registered on a cellphone tower overlooking the bank where the robbery took place. Cellphone technology can work the other way, too, providing alibis to prove one's innocence.
Such cellphone location data would potentially be critical to solving the sunflower murder case. All the leading actors in the drama claimed to have been carrying Vodacom cellphones on the morning of the alleged crime. The curious history of Pakisi's phone is dealt with in footnote [2] below. Here we focus on the four devices belonging to Doorewaard and Schutte. In court, the two Afrikaners rejected Pakisi's account in its entirety, claiming they'd never even seen him before, let alone taken him on a two-hour hell ride to lonely places where he could be terrorized and intimidated without anyone seeing. So, in theory at least, cellphone location data could be dispositive.
https://twitter.com/J_chabalala/status/1103222727702466561
Given the public importance of this case, and the critical nature of this particular evidence to it, it is necessary to lay out the evidence in three separate parts. The question we will seek to answer is a simple one: are Doorewaard & Schutte guilty of the crimes for which they were convicted?
In Part 1 we map out the two different and wholly incompatible versions of what happened that morning. A depicts the version presented by the accused at their bail April 2017 bail hearing and during their trial. B depicts one of the versions presented by sole witness Pakisi.
In Part 2 we introduce the cellphone location data that was presented to court by Vodacom's forensic experts.
In Part 3 we examine what that data says about the validity of these two incompatible versions.
Part 1: A tale of two journeys
A. Doorewaard and Schutte's account
Doorewaard & Schutte's account of the fateful day begins at 7am, when they reported for work at their employer's workshop in Coligny. They claimed they remained at the workshop until just after 9am, when they headed off to collect samples from a peanut field a five minute (5km) drive from town in a north westerly direction. See below.
On their way back at around 9.30am they said they saw two teenagers stealing sunflower heads in a field belonging to their employer. They apprehended one, Moshoeu, and told him to get in the back of the bakkie. After a brief period driving back and forth looking for his accomplice, they headed towards town to report Moshoeu at the police station.
As they approached a bend in the road, Doorewaard and Schutte notice that Moshoeu was no longer on the back of their bakkie. They testified in court that they assumed he had jumped off, although they did not actually see this happen. On turning back they found him lying motionless in the road, bleeding. Reluctant to move Moshoeu for fear of aggravating his injuries, they asked two passers-by to watch over him while they rushed into town to report the accident at the police station, and get the SAPS to summon an ambulance from Lichtenburg.
Map 1: Doorewaard & Schutte's version