Pretoria | Tuesday
THE courtroom in the Pretoria High Court was packed on Tuesday where judgement commenced in the trial of five Pietersburg rugby players accused of murdering 19-year-old Tshepo Matloha.
The final verdict, however, will only be known later in the week.
Some people were standing in the aisles because they could not find a place to sit.
Chairs were carried in to accommodate Matloha’s relatives and those of the accused, as well as three Northern Province MECs – Catherine Mabuza (MEC in the office of the premier), Dikeledi Magadzi (safety and security) and Makwene Semenya (sports, arts and culture). Provincial Pan Africanist Congress leader Maxwell Nemadzivhanani also attended.
Judge Bernard Ngoepe on Tuesday started his judgement by summarising the evidence of six of the State witnesses, including that of the two complainants in the attempted murder charges, Alex and Melford Motlokwana.
Matloha and the Motlokwana cousins were poaching on a hunting farm near Dendron in the Northern Province on March 25 last year, the day of the crimes.
The five accused – Riaan Botha, Kobus Joubert, Ben Korff, Francois Velloen and Corne Kloppers – and six other members of the Noordelikes rugby club in Pietersburg spent the weekend on the farm. Botha was the manager of the farm, which belongs to his mother.
According to the state pathologist who did the post mortem, the cause of Matloha’s death was blunt force trauma to the head and chest.
Louis Strydom, a former club member who testified for the State, said Botha had struck the youth with the butt of his rifle in the face several times.
Korff had jumped on Matloha’s body with both feet and kicked him, Strydom said.
Alex Motlokwana, who was wounded on that day, said those who had shot him, must have seen him.
Melford Motlokwana testified that just as he and the two others were to leave the farm through a fence, he saw a bakkie carrying white people who fired shots at them. He was not injured.
Besides the murder and attempted murder charges against all five accused, Botha and Joubert are charged with defeating the ends of justice for having thrown Matloha’s body into a dam, from where it was retrieved about a week after the incident.
Ngoepe earlier found Korff, Velloen and Kloppers not guilty on that charge.
Botha is the only one still facing a charge of malicious damage to property, which relates to the shooting of five dogs belonging to Matloha and the Motlokwana cousins. Ngoepe earlier found the other four not guilty on that charge.
All five pleaded not guilty to all the charges against them.
At the start of the trial in January, all charges were withdrawn against four other rugby players.
Ngoepe on Tuesday again explained that the court had not acquitted those four – Johan van Ravenstein, Rudolph Adendorff, Willem Boshoff and Jaco Hartslief. The State chose not to prosecute them, he said.
The judgement continues on Wednesday. – Sapa