January 22, 2009
09/02/2004 14:30 - (SA)
Pretoria - Two very different worlds collided briefly in the Pretoria High Court on Monday when some of the accused in the Boeremag treason trial came to hear a transvestite testify on his alleged rape in prison.
Two of the Boeremag accused and the wife of another were seen briefly in the eighth-floor courtroom where the Jali Commission of Inquiry is holding its public hearings.
It was later established that the Boeremag trial adjourned at 11:0 for about three hours, leaving the accused with some time to kill.
The three looked rather out of place among a colourful group of cross-dressers, some with long, red finger nails, gathered in the courtroom.
Cross-examination continued before the Jali Commission on Monday of Louis Karp, who dresses like a woman and prefers to be called Louisa.
He was dressed on Monday in jeans, high heels, a yellow T-shirt, a golden belt - all rounded off with a delicate neck scarf.
Karp claims to have been raped and abused while awaiting trail for car theft in the Pretoria local prison in 2001 and 2002.
Prison chief denies fabricating evidence
In the morning, prison head Nico Baloyi denied having colluded to fabricate evidence to discredit Karp as a witness.
"I wish to state on record that I am being wrongly accused," Baloyi told commission chair Thabane Jali, and pledged his full co-operation with the probe.
Last week, evidence leader Graham Barlow told the commission that Baloyi had been implicated in an alleged attempt to fabricate evidence.
Baloyi on Monday also denied that he ever swore at Karp or that he was prejudiced against gay people.
"I have no problems regarding gay people. I treat all prisoners equally," he said.
Baloyi dismissed Karp's claims that he had locked him up in isolation as a punishment for complaining against warders.
He had put Karp in a single cell the first time for escaping from prison and the second time for attempting to do so again, the prison head said.
The third time he placed Karp in isolation to protect him from a fellow prisoner Karp had accused of raping him, Baloyi said. |
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Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
10/02/2004 14:51 - (SA)
Pretoria - A Pretoria Local Prison doctor admitted on Tuesday that rape among inmates was "very common", and measures to deal with it were inadequate.
Giving evidence before the Jali Commission of Inquiry into corruption and maladministration in prisons, Dr Kobeli Khomari was questioned at length about the lack of support structures for raped prisoners. Khomari agreed this amounted to a callous disregard for the rights of victims.
Khomari, a part-time doctor at t... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
11/02/2004 14:46 - (SA)
Pretoria - A senior Correctional Services health official acknowledged on Wednesday there was a wide gap between policy developed for the treatment of rape victims in jail and its actual implementation.
Health care services director Maria Mabena conceded that Correctional Services health care officials were sometimes not informed of such policies.
"I acknowledge there is a gap that needs to be looked at," she testified before the Jali commission of inquiry into p... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
11/02/2004 16:19 - (SA)
Pretoria - Consensual sex between male prisoners was still classified under the old offence of sodomy, the Jali Commission of Inquiry into prison mal-administration heard on Wednesday.
Evidence would be led before the commission that a provision to this effect still existed in a policy of the correctional services department, evidence leader Graham Barlow said on Wednesday.
And the provision was still being administered - with two Pretoria prisoners charged only ... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
16/02/2004 17:14 - (SA)
Pretoria - There was currently no means of protecting awaiting-trial prisoners from rape in jail, the Jali Commission of Inquiry into prison mal-administration heard on Monday.
"You can get a guy who stole a bread because he was hungry with a serial rapist in one cell," Pretoria local prison social worker Helena du Toit testified.
To rectify this, she said a system should be introduced of classifying unsentenced inmates into different categories - as was done with ... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
18/02/2004 15:13 - (SA)
Pretoria - A convicted rapist recounted on Wednesday how he was repeatedly violated in the Pretoria Central Prison.
"I need assistance as I am now sick and these prisoners who sodomised me are all released," John Ngwako said in an affidavit presented in Pretoria to the Jali Commission of Inquiry into prison maladministration.
In the document, Ngwako claimed he was sodomised by three fellow inmates one after the other in October 2002. This happened in a cell on on... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
Maartens, a former Pretoria Local Prison inmate, testified on Tuesday that he was repeatedly raped between November 2001 and January the following year while awaiting trial. He claimed he had suffered from a serious infection resulting from a venereal disease he contracted from the rapes. Maartens was asked by Benedict Ndaba, for warders Richard Makhanya and Moses Malisa, why his allegations against them were not contained in his original affidavit. Among other things, he claimed he had to pa... Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
25/02/2005 08:45 - (SA)
Pietermaritzburg - A 29-year-old Chatsworth man who allegedly contracted the HI-virus after being sodomised at Westville Prison in 1998, is suing Correctional Services Minister Ngconde Balfour for more than R4m.
According to the particulars of claim, the man was only in prison because he had not yet paid his R500 bail after being arrested for theft.
While in prison from November 25 to November 29, he was assaulted and sodomised by one or more of the prisoners aft... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
STRUGGLE IN CELL FOR SURVIVAL
HUNTER ASSULTED, THREATENED WITH RAPE
A hunting expidition turned into a nightmare for an ex-policeman when he was arrested for crimen injuria and placed in a crowded cell for the weekend with people who assualted him and wanted to rape him.
Mr Sakkie van der Mescht (37) from Rustenburg, Northwest, is said to have been assualted repeatedly. He claims he was stabbed in the head with a knife and another sharp object. His cellmates also tried to rape him, but he ... | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
January 22, 2009
Oudpolisieman se sel-helJul 23 2008 10:27:36:783PM
Linda de Beer
’n Jaguitstappie het in ’n nagmerrie ontaard vir ’n oudpolisieman toe hy weens crimen injuria ’n naweek lank in ’n vol sel aangehou is met mense wat hom aangerand het en wou verkrag.
Mnr. Sakkie van der Mescht (37) van Rustenburg, Noordwes, is na bewering herhaaldelik in die selle aangerand. Hy beweer hy is onder meer met ’n mes en nog ’n skerp voorwerp in die kop gesteek. Sy selmaats het hom ook probee... | | Continue reading...
Posted by Memory Grace.
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