Counsel for the defence in the Jeppestown murder and robbery trial on Thursday objected to what it termed a ”hybrid identification procedure” that it believed could prejudice the 13 accused.
”This is a hybrid procedure that buttresses the memory of the witness,” said Sidwell Ford in the Johannesburg High Court on Thursday, referring to a witness having seen a pack of photographs of the 13 before the trial.
On Wednesday, Pick n Pay supervisor Sarah Marumole looked at the pack of photographs in court.
She said that she had already seen them in a consultation with the state prosecutor, and after some time examining them again, identified one of the suspects.
On Thursday, the court heard that at a previous identification parade at Pretoria’s C-Max prison she did not identify anyone because she was scared.
Ford believed that by seeing the photographs with the prosecutor in a private consultation there was a possibility that she could have been coached and could have remembered the number on the back of the photograph she identified.
”It is highly prejudicial to the defence,” said Ford.
He said if he had known previously that this had happened he would have objected strenuously.
”We are now, in fact, not by intent, ambushed,” said Ford.
”This smacks of a rehearsal, of a coaching of a witness.”
But he added quickly that he was not suggesting that this had in fact happened.
A visibly irritated prosecutor, Joanie Spies, retorted that she was under no obligation to notify the defence that she was going to do this in a consultation, or invite them to be present at the consultation.
”The pictures shown in [the exhibit] are exactly the same photographs … If I called him in when I showed her the photographs, it infringes my right to consult with my client,” she said.
She said the defence could cross-examine the witness on the photographs and she was under no obligation to share all her notes with them.
”There are elements that will surprise the defence, but I’m not under any obligation to give them those notes. Cross-examine the witness.”
One woman and twelve men are implicated in a robbery at a Pick n Pay supermarket in Honeydew, which ended in a police chase and shoot-out in Jeppestown, Johannesburg, on June 25 2006, leaving twelve people dead.
Four of the dead were police officers. — Sapa