South Africa - Martin, 55, Theresa, 54, Rudi van Breda, 22, murdered, 26 Jan 2015 #3

[Really?]

Panayiotou resumes on 26 September and I'll be following it again. Things run smoothly in that trial.

This trial is pure farce now. Once the blood spatter expert has finished, the defence will probably say they don't want to start until the next batch of dates.

That sounds like a fascinating case......affair, nightclub.....people with the last name "Breakfast"....... I'm reading up on it now....

 

[Fluffykins]

https://twitter.com/AJGMolyneaux

Col. Beneke took a statement from Marli according to Botha. Appollis says he is not aware of it

Judge now asking questions of A. Was the axe found the only axe in house? A: yes. J:was gate open next to house?A:it was locked.

Botha stands up and says the gate had the key in it at all times and could be opened. A: true.

Botha now heads over to axe. Jean testified that there was a different axe. Botha asks Appollis if he is saying that Jean is lying?

A: No not at all. We didn't find an axe with that description on the scene.

A part of the axe is black on top so Jean's testimony didn't give enough description of axe head so might have been the same one.

Judge says Inv. Officer may step down. Galloway says they only have one more witness-Captain Joubert. He is still ill.

Galloway says Joubert will be in court on Monday morning. Meaning we will now postpone to Monday.

rsbm

Only one more witness? So nothing from Marli then. Wasn't there going to be a neurologist? Would they be appearing for the defence then?

 

[Tortoise]

rsbm

Only one more witness? So nothing from Marli then. Wasn't there going to be a neurologist? Would they be appearing for the defence then?

I like to think that even if Marli has blocked out memories of the attack, and even of the evening before, she would be helpful to the state in terms of being an insider with knowledge of family dynamics, and any problems they had with Henri in and after Australia. It could be a matter of Marli not being comfortable casting aspersions - on either deceased family members or even Henri, if she really doesn't know if he was responsible and doesn't want to have any hand in his conviction. Imagine knowing that Henri had been a major headache for their family with all kinds of behavioural and personality issues, but at the same time she didn't think he was capable of this massacre, and trying to kill her. I wouldn't blame her if she said she didn't want to testify and if she wants the case to be proven without her input. It's a big ask for a sister, and one who was still, naturally, quite immature at the time.

Perhaps the state feels they will leave it to the defence to call her, so that they can cross-examine her, with obvious sensitivity, but which they wouldn't be able to do if she was their witness. Then again the defence will know that could be the state's intention and also may decide not to call her as a witness. In that case I'm not sure if Desai would be able to make any inferences, from both sides not calling her. She would definitely have information to assist the court, that no other family member would have insight into, and it would be difficult not to make the inference that everything was not hunky dory.

This would be compounded if Henri chooses not to take the stand. I'm not at all certain he will testify.

Desai will be left with outside impressions of the family, the whatsapp messages between Marli and b/f showing quite an explosive heated family argument, a neighbour hearing an explosive row between the men, and big family upheaval preceding the murders, Australia not working out and a move in Australia also, Henri leaving university before completing his degree, and intending to go scuba diving. Not to mention a story of the events of that night that a child would laugh at.

 

[Interested Bystander]

https://twitter.com/AJGMolyneaux

Col. Beneke took a statement from Marli according to Botha. Appollis says he is not aware of it

Judge now asking questions of A. Was the axe found the only axe in house? A: yes. J:was gate open next to house?A:it was locked.

Botha stands up and says the gate had the key in it at all times and could be opened. A: true.

Botha now heads over to axe. Jean testified that there was a different axe. Botha asks Appollis if he is saying that Jean is lying?

A: No not at all. We didn't find an axe with that description on the scene.

A part of the axe is black on top so Jean's testimony didn't give enough description of axe head so might have been the same one.

Judge says Inv. Officer may step down. Galloway says they only have one more witness-Captain Joubert. He is still ill.

Galloway says Joubert will be in court on Monday morning. Meaning we will now postpone to Monday.

First BIB

I think this harks back to when Botha was trying to claim that HvB was in fact under suspicion from the outset and the State claims he wasn't and he was just "helping them put the story together (my words)". The following was reported at the time.

"Under cross-examination‚ Botha said Van Breda's statement claimed Colonel Deon Beneke told the accused that he had taken a statement from Marli who had “told us everything".

No doubt we will hear more of this when Botha closes.

 

[JudgeJudi]

What a total waste of court time. Less than an hour. This is going to be another OP long drawn out case where the culprit spends a couple of years living it up before he gets his comeuppance. On what grounds HvB could appeal I know not but we can be fairly sure he will. That will be his "keep out of jail as long as I can" tactic.

Apologies if some of my posts seem a little strange. My keyboard/computer has started entering endings of words way back in the sentence or even the paragraph before and sometimes I fail to notice. It seems it is because I type too quickly. I have had this trouble before and downloaded a program that stops it. I must see if I can find it again. I have a new OS so I guess the program was not copied over during the change.

See you Monday in the hope that Joubert is in fine fettle.

Hi IB, I think we were all pretty annoyed today. We didn't even make it to morning tea.

About you typing issues, try using compatibility mode and see if that fixes the problem -
cog, compatibility view settings, and add websleuths.com. If that doesn't resolve the issue you can go back and remove it.

 

[Interested Bystander]

Hi IB, I think we were all pretty annoyed today. We didn't even make it to morning tea.

About you typing issues, try using compatibility mode and see if that fixes the problem -
cog, compatibility view settings, and add websleuths.com. If that doesn't resolve the issue you can go back and remove it.

Hi JJ,

I downloaded some new mouse drivers from Dell (the makers) and all seems OK now but thanks for the heads up.

 

[JudgeJudi]

rsbm

Only one more witness? So nothing from Marli then. Wasn't there going to be a neurologist? Would they be appearing for the defence then?

I didn't read that the State were calling one, only that HvB has engaged the services of a Dr Mike du Trevou who can testify about Henri's injuries which apparently left him unconscious.

Bearing in mind the testimony of Dr Tiemensma that the average duration is a couple of seconds to a minute at most, I rather doubt this doctor will testify.

 

[tmar]

Hi everybody :wave: Pull up a chair and enjoy these treats!

As always, today's trial will begin whenever and last for who knows? We'll get through this somehow, justice for Martin, Teresa, Rudi and Marli.

I'm part of everyone, and certainly am pulling up a chair, and I'm imagining sharing these lovely treats.
Careful, you'll all become 'fatties', munching on these.

 

[Interested Bystander]

Traceyams report on Day 32 of the trial. Always worth reading.

Advocate Galloway cleverly only asked one question in re-examination. She asked Nel to distinguish the presumptive nature of her results to the results of DNA. Nel stated the obvious, DNA is conclusive, a nice reminder to the court not to consider this evidence in isolation.

http://www.capetownetc.com/news/van-breda-trial/van-breda-trial-day-32/

 

[Interested Bystander]

Traceyams report on Day 33

http://www.capetownetc.com/news/van-breda-trial-day-33/

One axe, or two?

A noteworthy takeout is that Judge Desai and his assessor raised the issue of their being the possibility of more than one axe at the scene, which was put to Sgt. Appollis right at the end of his testimony today.

This isn’t the first time Judge Desai has sought clarity from witnesses in this regard. Today, the Judge asked the witness how many axes were found on the scene and Sgt. Appollis confirmed that there was only one axe – the murder weapon.

 

[JudgeJudi]

Here’s some dirt on Henri, literally and figuratively.

Danielle’s CV reveals her as sporty and outgoing. Yet that all changed after meeting HvB at chef school. We know that he dropped out but she did too.

Their guest house routine is stock standard for the couple. They rise late and spend the day in each other’s pockets, says a reliable source, seldom socialising with friends or family, and rarely getting out much.

“They were possibly our most filthy, disgusting guests we’ve ever had,” said the landlord. “I don’t think they ever washed a thing in the room. It looked like they were eating off dirty plates. Normally, we’d send the housekeeper in to clean up but I couldn’t subject her to that mess. I thought it was possible they had been evicted from their previous place. We had to give the place a really good spring clean after they left”.

“I’m so glad they were out of here. They were filthy pigs. The place was like a pig sty. It was filthy. Rubbish that you and I would throw in a bin was all over the floor and there was leftover food all over the place”.

ETA This is quite an interesting article and worth reading.

[URL]https://www.pressreader.com/south-africa/weekend-argus-saturday-edition/20170325/281608125261791[/URL]

 

[JudgeJudi]

I doubt whether it would really benefit either side to call Marli. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if no-one, including her treating doctors, knows for sure whether she’s still suffering retrograde amnesia as she may not want to reveal her present mental state for various reasons.

If her memory has returned and Henri was not the attacker, she would have spoken up by now.

If she remembers that night and it was Henri, I'm sure she wouldn't want to go through the mental anguish of what she saw, heard and suffered. Both sides would have to walk on eggshells and the defence would say that due to her severe head injuries and past amnesia that her evidence is unreliable.

If she still has no memory of the event, or indeed shortly beforehand (days or weeks), the most she could really state is what the family dynamics had been up to a certain point. Why would she say anything to suggest he may have been the attacker when he is the only other surviving member of her family. I’m sure she would prefer to learn there was an attacker and that HvB was innocent.

However, it’s interesting to note that in the first week of May 2015 she took to social media and posted two photographs, one of her parents and the other of Rudi and her dad. She captioned the pictures, “The people that I love the most.” She didn’t mention or include a photograph of Henri.

Here are the photos she posted:

[URL]http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/05/09/16/287EABD300000578-3074716-image-a-1_1431184639656.jpg[/URL]

[URL]https://image.iol.co.za/image/1/process/620x349?source=https://inm-baobab-prod-eu-west-1.s3.amazonaws.com/public/inm/media/file/1/1856108/1431109967/image/3454256469.jpg[/URL]

 

[JudgeJudi]

You'll recall that Marli's ex-boyfriend, James Reade-Jahn, was shown the actual axe that was used. He said it looked very similar to the one he had seen but the one he remembers was black. Judge Desai asked whether there were in fact two axes.

Perhaps James viewed the axe in natural light only inside the garage and the courtroom was much brighter. These two photos provide a good illustration. The axes are in fact the same as can be seen by the pink circular label on the blade.

[URL]http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/05/17/16/4029CD5600000578-0-image-a-52_1495034914552.jpg[/URL]

[URL]https://www.iol.co.za/capeargus/news/vanbredatrial-ballistics-expert-grilled-by-defence-9772317?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter[/URL]

 

[Tortoise]

Remember his police statement on the day of the murders -

"I do not know whose axe it was because I did not know that we had an axe in the house."

I suppose he'll blame that on the policeman who took the statement.

 

[Tortoise]

Traceyams report on Day 33

http://www.capetownetc.com/news/van-breda-trial-day-33/

One axe, or two?

A noteworthy takeout is that Judge Desai and his assessor raised the issue of their being the possibility of more than one axe at the scene, which was put to Sgt. Appollis right at the end of his testimony today.

This isn’t the first time Judge Desai has sought clarity from witnesses in this regard. Today, the Judge asked the witness how many axes were found on the scene and Sgt. Appollis confirmed that there was only one axe – the murder weapon.

I don't understand the defence tactics in this regard.

Henri claims he saw the guy with one axe. Trying to explain why one attacker was able to get in and out without leaving a footprint is hard enough, but he seems to want to introduce a second axeman who also left no footprints, or blood trail outside. To what end? It just makes the story even more unbelievable, to say that two attackers came armed with one axe, took the family axe from the pantry, left their own axe behind, and fled with the family's axe. Why would the guy downstairs need to take the family axe? It can't fit in a pocket or down a trouser leg without hindering his ability to walk or run and would stop him from being able to scale the wall if he had an axe in his hand. It's just stupid, and I don't see the benefit to Henri's story.

 

[bleuboy]

I've been following this case from thread one and I'm as flabbergasted now as I was then over why Henri is not locked up while the trial is ongoing. One thing I will note is the judge is doing a fantastic job asking all relevant questions. I'm really Hoping the verdict is guilty. This is the most frustrating case I've followed. Thankyou to the WSers that are providing all the news24 links.

 

[Interested Bystander]

I don't understand the defence tactics in this regard.

Henri claims he saw the guy with one axe. Trying to explain why one attacker was able to get in and out without leaving a footprint is hard enough, but he seems to want to introduce a second axeman who also left no footprints, or blood trail outside. To what end? It just makes the story even more unbelievable, to say that two attackers came armed with one axe, took the family axe from the pantry, left their own axe behind, and fled with the family's axe. Why would the guy downstairs need to take the family axe? It can't fit in a pocket or down a trouser leg without hindering his ability to walk or run and would stop him from being able to scale the wall if he had an axe in his hand. It's just stupid, and I don't see the benefit to Henri's story.

I think is typical of Botha et al. Throw absolutely anything in the mix and hope that something causes an upset of some value to the DT. I think the lack of any real evidence of intruders is one hill too high for Botha to climb. I am sure Desai sees through the cr*p.

 

[Fluffykins]

rsbm

However, it’s interesting to note that in the first week of May 2015 she took to social media and posted two photographs, one of her parents and the other of Rudi and her dad. She captioned the pictures, “The people that I love the most.” She didn’t mention or include a photograph of Henri.

Here are the photos she posted:

Oh my, that is so telling. So pointed. Wasn't feeling the love for Henri. Wasn't going to pretend to.

Poor little possum, all that she lost. :cry:

 

[JudgeJudi]

The State’s final witness, Captain Joubert, blood spatter expert, will testify on Monday.

The blood on HvB’s pyjama pants, T-shirt and elsewhere in the home could help solve the mystery surrounding the murders. The State's forensic evidence includes the long grey pyjama pants which HvB said in his statement he'd worn that night. The police had kept the pants because they seemingly had blood on them.

Independent experts said the State and HvB’s version of what happened would depend on the testimony of blood spatter experts particularly.

Wes van der Westhuizen said, "Blood spatter patterns and DNA will find the accused in the axe murders guilty or acquit him. The victims all had head wounds, so there was a lot of blood. The attacker would obviously also have been full of blood and if he had walked around in the house, there would have been blood dripping from the murder weapon." He said it is probably possible to determine where the attacker had stood, how the blood had got on the grey pants and where blood might possibly have been washed off in the house.

Another independent expert said if there was DNA from Marli on the clothes HvB was wearing that night, it would raise many questions. "Nowhere in his statement did the accused say that he tried to help the victims or that he touched them".

Henri has acquired the services of Dr Reggie Perumal, a pathologist, and Cobus Steyl, a ballistics expert who can testify about the projection of the axe which allegedly was thrown.

[URL]http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/blood-dna-are-key-to-unlocking-van-breda-murder-mystery-experts-20170807#cxrecs_s[/URL]

 

[Interested Bystander]

What happened to the nine dishcloths and mop evidence? Was there no blood on them after all? Will that be something Joubert deals with?