Pretoria High Court Judge Nkola Motata was given another chance on Tuesday to try and block a lower court from hearing recordings of his alleged drunken diatribe after a car accident.
This was after Nkola’s drunken-driving trial was postponed in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s court until July 2 2008, when it will proceed for a full month.
The postponement of the case came after Nair turned down an application by the defence to temporarily block the court from listening to recordings of Motata’s alleged drunken diatribe.
Last week Nair ruled that five recordings of Motata after his accident could be heard as part of a trial-within-a-trial to determine their admissibility.
The defence then applied for a postponement in order to give them time to have Nair’s ruling reviewed by the high court.
Nair turned down the application for a specific postponement to allow a high-court review.
However, Nair said he would postpone the trial in the hope that by conducting it in a single block of time, it would ”ensure continuity” and be resolved speedily.
”What we have decided is to place the matter in the manner in which matters are placed on the High Court role. We have now placed it for a full month of the court from the 2nd of July,” said Nair.
”There is no other way,” he said.
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Defence advocate Danie Dorfling told the South African Press Association (Sapa) that the defence would use the postponement to apply for a high-court review.
He said although the defence was not yet sure exactly when it would proceed with the review application, it would try and get the review ruling completed before the trial resumed.
Earlier, Nair said he was turning down the application for a specific postponement to allow the review to try and prevent the defence from making the case obstructive.
”The question that I must answer is when can a party rely on these provisions of review? What is clear is that this is not an absolute right. The accused does not have a free hand to do so … [allowing the application] will amount to an abuse of the process of review.”
Nair said there had been considerable delays in the matter and trial dates had been postponed.
”There have been no fewer than five applications I have had to give rulings on,” he said.
”The bulk of the [court transcript] so far has been made up of argument. We have not gone through even 50% of the state witnesses [testimony].
However, later in court, when announcing the postponement, Nair said he considered the trial not to have been unduly delayed.
”I would not come to the conclusion that [the trial] has been an extraordinary period of time”
”I am fully aware that matters [in the magistrate’s court] sometimes have an average lifespan of over a year or two years.”
Speaking outside court, defence attorney Marinus Van Jaarsveld said there were ”no delays” and ”no blame” about how long the case was taking.
He said his client was not getting any special treatment by the courts.
”He’s been dealt with exactly the same as any other accused,” said Van Jaarsveld.
On January 6, Motata crashed his Jaguar into the house of Richard Baird. Baird is now a state witness.
The court has heard that Baird made recordings at the scene of the accident with his cellphone.
This month, Nair granted the defence the right to have a trial-within-a-trial to determine if the recordings could be submitted as credible evidence.
The defence then tried to block the court hearing the recordings, saying their admissibility could be assessed without actually listening to them.
Motata is facing charges of driving under the influence of alcohol with an alternate charge of reckless or negligent driving, and defeating the ends of justice, with an alternative charge of resisting arrest.
Van Jaarsveld said Motata was currently on paid leave from his position as a judge in the Pretoria High Court. – Sapa