One of the accused in the Boeremag treason trial on Monday blamed police for the disappearance of two of his co-accused as police announced new and stringent security measures at the resumption of the trial.
Herman van Rooyen and Rudi Gouws disappeared from court during a lunch break two weeks ago. Police have been searching for the two, and have put them on an Interpol list, but Tom Vorster — one of the accused still in custody — said the police had a hand in their disappearance.
”I think it is the police who have abducted them,” he said on Monday when the trial resumed in the Pretoria High Court.
The state objected to Vorster’s accusations. He then said he was just thinking aloud, and dropped the matter.
Police spokesperson Director Sally de Beer, who attended the trial, told reporters outside the court the accusation was completely untrue. ”There have been… unfair allegations about police action since the escape,” she said.
One of the claims had been that police would shoot the accused when they were found. ”We arrested them the first time round without a shot being fired.”
De Beer said police are still searching for Van Rooyen and Gouws, and that a ”certain amount” of information is being followed up in all provinces.
The trial was postponed on May 4 to give police a change to rearrest the two escapees.
On Monday, however, Judge Eben Jordaan ordered that the trial continue without the two being present.
Gouws and Van Rooyen’s advocate, Piet Pistorius, said he will continue to represent Gouws at the request of the Legal Aid Board, but that he will not represent Van Rooyen until he is found.
Senior Superintendent Louis Bester, who is part of the police security team at court, told the remaining 20 accused, their legal representatives and those attending the case that no communication devices will be allowed in court as part of new security measures.
No cellphone calls will be allowed from inside the Pretoria High Court. The accused will not be allowed to make any calls, including from the public phones just outside the courtroom.
Laptops inside the court with 3G cards, internet and e-mail may also not be used. People entering the courtroom will be searched.
The remaining accused have been moved to new holding cells under the court.
”We have withdrawn some extraordinary privileges afforded to the accused,” De Beer told reporters outside the court. — Sapa