Bird Island author Chris Steyn takes lie detector test as controversy rages on

LONDON — Sometimes the crude manipulation of society’s wilfully ignorant, beggars belief. Instead of interrogating the facts by actually reading them, some blindly loyal ANC Youth League members in the Free State are now planning a public burning of Pieter-Louis Myburgh’s book that exposes former premier Ace Magashule. A rational mind quickly sees past the noise to what is an inevitable conclusion for the deeply implicated politician. Recalling the similar reaction to Myburgh’s previous book on the Gupta family, and, indeed, Jacques Pauw’s masterful treatise The President’s Keepers. It’s worth bearing this in mind when assessing the hostile reaction to Chris Steyn’s mind-blowing exposé on the Bird Island paedophile ring. As with Myburgh and Pauw, her book exposes a very dark side to what were once very powerful people. But unlike the two male authors whose bona fides are mostly accepted, Steyn has been widely and very publicly accused of making it all up – including by some who ply her difficult trade, writers who at the very least should be giving her the benefit of doubt. I’m in no doubt about the veracity of her story. Having worked closely with Chris Steyn, I rate her alongside Barry Sergeant as both courageous and a fastidious fact-checker. And while it is shameful that she needed to go to such lengths, she deserves admiration for subjecting herself to examination by the world’s pre-eminent practitioner of lie detection. What should now be obvious to all, especially the cynics, is that Chris Steyn won’t lie down. And as nothing is more powerful than the truth, as with the noxious Magashule, there’s a sense of inevitability on how this will all end. – Alec Hogg

Statement – Chris Steyn – co-author of The Lost Boys of Bird Island

I have taken a “Lie Detector” test following claims that I fabricated allegations in The Lost Boys of Bird Island, the book I co-wrote with Mark Minnie. The former detective died of a gunshot wound eight days after publication.

My polygraph examination was conducted by Raymond Nelson, past President of the American Polygraph Association (APA) – currently serving as an elected member of the APA Board of Directors. Mr. Nelson has published more than 150 scientific studies and instructional articles on all aspects of the polygraph test, and has given training at schools and conferences internationally. Mr. Nelson has testified as an expert witness on polygraph and psychotherapy matters in a number of court cases, as well as arbitration hearings, military courts, and administrative law courts. Mr. Nelson is the recipient of several awards, including the Cleve Backster Award and Leonard Keeler Award from the American Polygraph Association, and the prestigious Max Wastl Award President’s Award for Distinguished Service from the American Association of Police Polygraphists.

Mr Nelson – who was on a lecture tour in South Africa – administered the polygraph examination on April 1, 2019 – from 11:00AM to 2:00PM – in the office of Ben Lombaard of LieTech Polygraph & Forensic Services in Cape Town.

These were the key questions:

In your book Lost Boys of Bird Island did you fabricate any of your reported information sources? – NO (No Significant Reactions Indicative of Deception)

Did you falsify any of the allegations you wrote about those persons in your book Lost Boys of Bird Island? – NO (No Significant Reactions Indicative of Deception)

Regarding your book Lost Boys of Bird Island did you falsify any of the reported allegations about those persons? – NO (No Significant Reactions Indicative of Deception)

In your book Lost Boys of Bird Island did you include any of those allegations without an actual human source? – NO (No Significant Reactions Indicative of Deception)

It is the expert opinion of Mr Nelson that I was truthful when answering NO to the above questions about whether I falsified any of the allegations or information sources in the book.

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