The Kennedy Road Thirteen have now appeared in court 6 times – each time in the face of an often drunken and armed ANC mob making open threats against AbM and its leaders. On each occasion the prosecution have failed to provide any evidence that the accused may be guilty of the crimes for which they have been arrested. On each occasion the case has been remanded to give the police a chance to provide such evidence – and in each case they have failed to do so. Are these endless delays not a means of achieving their detention without trial and without a bail hearing? The Kennedy Thirteen were severely assaulted in the Sydenham Police Station after their arrest and are also being subject to assault in Westville prison.
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Kennedy Road’s 13 murder accused still wait for bail
November 05, 2009 Edition 2
Irene Kuppan
Thirteen people accused of the murders of two residents of the Kennedy Road Informal Settlement will spend at least two more weeks behind bars as they wait for the outcome of their bail application.
Although it seemed as if Magistrate B Mbulawa would give a judgment on the bail application yesterday, she eventually adjourned the case to November 18 without reaching a decision.
Mbulawa said after reflecting on all the evidence before her, she felt she needed to know which charges each of the 13 accused faced before reaching her decision. She said it would be unfair to deal with the case as if all 13 were facing the same charges.
For this to be clarified, an identity parade would have to be held for witnesses to point out which accused were allegedly involved in which offence, said investigating officer Inspector Krishna Naidoo.
The case was then adjourned, giving Naidoo two weeks to conduct the identity parade.
The 13 suspects, who appeared in the Durban Magistrate’s Court yesterday, are said to be part of a gang that allegedly attacked residents at the informal settlement in September, killing two and injuring others.
The charges they face include two counts of murder, two counts of attempted murder, two counts of robbery with aggravating circumstances and two counts of assault with the intent to do grievous bodily harm, public violence and malicious damage to property.
Earlier in the bail application, Naidoo told the court some of the accused were part of a safety forum at the settlement and, while the committee operated, it imposed harsh regulations on the community.
Naidoo said according to residents, unhappiness about these rules and regulations had led to the violence in the area.
Under cross examination by defence advocate Terence Seery yesterday, Naidoo conceded that it was unlikely that 10 people (in the forum) would take on a community of 7 000 people.
The policeman said he was unaware that seven of the 10 members of the forum were Xhosa.
Seery said his instructions were that on the night of the attacks, a group of people was moving through the community shouting anti-Xhosa slogans in Zulu and it was this group that was the aggressor on that night.
Responding to Seery’s questions about a possible motive for the attacks, Naidoo said witnesses claimed that when they were being attacked they were asked why they were revolting against the forum.
The advocate questioned whether the friction between the Xhosa and Zulu communities, which the policemen referred to earlier, could have been a motive for the alleged attacks.