Two Boeremag treason trial accused claimed in the Pretoria High Court on Monday that police spy Johan (JC) Smit was behind a plot to have them killed.
Counsel for Adriaan van Wyk said a statement made by Smit in an unrelated murder investigation proved that Smit wanted Van Wyk dead. Smit is a key witness for the state in the treason trial.
Judge Eben Jordaan ruled that the statement could be used in cross-examination.
Smit is to testify in the High Court later this year that a Chris Streicher murdered Smit’s former boss, Nic van Rensburg.
Streicher, who put the blame for Van Rensburg’s murder on Smit when he appeared in a magistrate’s court, is to testify for the defence in the so-called Boeremag trial.
Van Wyk claimed Van Rensburg was murdered a few hours after an incident at Van Wyk’s house when a brick was thrown through a window. He only realised after his arrest that it had been an attempt on his life and that there had been a plan to assassinate both of them on the same day when he read Smit’s statement.
His complaint to the police about the incident was never followed up, he said.
He claimed Smit had a vendetta against him and wanted to destroy him. When he did not manage to have him killed, he had falsely implicated him in the Boeremag case to remove him from society in a ”legal” manner.
Van Wyk also claimed Smit and his handler, police Superintendent Louis Pretorius, regarded him as a ”threat” and said Van Wyk would testify that he had received numerous threats on his life.
The court heard that pardoned Strijdom Square mass murderer Barend Strydom would testify that Smit had told him Van Wyk was a traitor and should be killed.
Van Wyk’s claims are echoed in those of Tom Vorster, another man accused of being a Boeremag plotter. Vorster claims to have heard ”via the grapevine” that Smit had instructions to murder him.
The state objected to the defence using Smit’s statement, saying that it would prejudice Streicher’s murder trial.
Senior state advocate Paul Fick, leader of the state team, said there was no evidence to back up the defence claim that Smit was involved in Van Rensburg’s murder and Smit and his handler were involved in a cover-up.
Also on Monday, Jordaan asked the head of Pretoria’s local prison to give full reasons why another accused, Wilhelm Pretorius, had been forbidden to use his own laptop computer to prepare for the trial and read the record of proceedings.
This was after Pretorius’s lawyer complained that his client had been told he could only use his computer ”for study purposes”. Some of his fellow accused also used the computer to prepare for the trial.
Jordaan said the decision clearly prejudiced the accused and on the face of it did not make sense.
Cross-examination of Smit will continue on Tuesday. — Sapa