JOHANNESBURG: The murder trial of former ANC Youth League leader Patrick Wisani has been overshadowed by the judge's apparent confusion over the case's facts and a comment which led to the abrupt adjournment of proceedings.
While cross-examining Wisani in the high court in Johannesburg on Monday, prosecutor Faghre Mohamed asked why he hadn’t found it strange that he had found his girlfriend, Nosipho Mandleleni, wearing a hoodie and covered by a blanket in bed in summer.
Judge André Louw interjected: “It's quite warm today and it's in the middle of winter.”
He later added that it was meant as a light-hearted comment.
But Mohamed said that Louw had been insensitive to Mandleleni’s relatives in the gallery and asked for proceedings to be adjourned until today so that he could ask for advice from his superiors.
Throughout the proceedings, Judge Louw has apparently struggled to keep track of the facts, often confusing how different witnesses fitted into the picture, their names, as well as the times and locations that various events took place.
Wisani is accused of sjambokking Mandleleni to death in September. He was the ANC Youth League chairman for the Johannesburg inner city at the time.
Despite being told numerous times since the trial started that Wisani and Mandleleni shared a room in a communal house, Judge Louw seemed convinced that they lived in an apartment.
When Wisani described how he arrived home to find Mandleleni asleep on the bed, Louw asked: “Why did you go to the neighbours? So you shared a room with the accused?”
Wisani had to remind him that the deceased had been his girlfriend. The judge asked: “So did you find her in the next room in the passage?” Wisani responded: “No, in my room.”
Wisani came across confidently when he took the stand in his own defence, but became argumentative when Mohamed started cross-examining him.
During his testimony he claimed that he had arrived home from an ANC Youth League conference at only about 5am on the day of the murder. However, two witnesses had told the court they heard the couple fighting and Mandleleni screaming at around 4am.
Before Wisani testified, the court heard more graphic details about the injuries suffered by Mandleleni when a forensic pathologist, a paramedic and a police photographer gave evidence.
Forensic pathologist Dr Robert Ngude said he did not count how many lashes were on the young woman's body as there were too many.
He pointed out that the woman had injuries on her hand which showed that she had tried to defend herself from the blows.
Paramedic Stephan Henderson told the court that there were blood spatters and smears on the bedroom walls.
Police photographer Sibusiso Shongwe told the court how one of the murder weapons, the sjambok, as well as a vest covered in Nosipho’s blood were found hidden on the top shelf of a wardrobe in Wisani’s room. The trial continues today.