By Alex Eliseev
After a month of teary druglords, brave blondes and secret videotapes, the Jackie Selebi trial will be all about the numbers next week.
Tomorrow the state is set to begin leading evidence portrayed in a forensic KPMG report carried out on a business bank account central to the state's corruption case against Selebi.
It remains to be seen whether a financial lifestyle audit, reportedly carried out on former police commissioner, will form part of the report. Either way, the state hopes the numbers will bolster a case that gathered momentum this week.
On Friday, chief prosecutor Gerrie Nel finished with his third witness, chartered accountant Martin Flint. The balding man with long grey hair was called to the witness box in order to allow the prosecution to use evidence gathered from cheque stubs of the Spring Lights bank account.
Continues Below ↓
Spring Lights was a company that belonged to Flint but - according to testimony - was taken over for the purpose of channelling money from the Kebbles to Glenn Agliotti. Some of this money was allegedly used to bribe Selebi.
Flint gave evidence that he cashed cheques from the company's account, handed the money to Agliotti and wrote "JS" or "Chief" on the cheque stubs.
He was adamant he had no idea where the cash was headed and never suspected that "JS" stood for Jackie Selebi.
While Flint was there to complete the state's chain of evidence, it was his daughter who delivered the damaging blows to Selebi.
Dianne Muller - Agliotti's former fiancée - testified on Wednesday and Thursday.
The striking blonde did not flinch when, sitting just a few metres from Selebi, she labelled as "a lie" his assertion of not receiving any cash or gifts from Agliotti.
Muller told the court that, in December 2004, she helped Agliotti put R110 000 into a white bank bag and delivered it to a boardroom where he and Selebi were having a meeting. She put the bag down on the glass table and watched Agliotti slide it across with the words: "here you go my china".
She also said she overheard a telephone conversation in which Selebi asked Agliotti for a R10 000 loan. And finally, she recalled witnessing Selebi's two sons embark on a shopping spree at the Fubu clothing store in Sandton, and how Agliotti picked up the tab.
She described the relationship between Agliotti and Selebi as one "with gain", where the two men used each other. Her evidence was crucial as it corroborated important parts of the testimony Agliotti gave the Johannesburg High Court.
As expected, Agliotti's credibility was torn to shreds in cross-examination.
He admitted to lying and maintained that - according to his lexicon - he never bribed Selebi.
But Muller stood firm as defence advocate Jaap Cilliers, SC tried to undermine her objectivity and credibility by accusing her of benefiting - to the tune of R1.5 million - from the money in Spring Lights and to being bound to Agliotti (from whom she parted in 2003) through their financial affairs.
Agliotti stepped out of the witness box at the start of the week, revealing that he had gone to identify the body of slain mining magnate Brett Kebble the day after he was slain in September 2005.
Even on that day, Selebi had called him to ask for cash, Agliotti said.
Selebi has yet to give any explanation for his meetings with Agliotti, but insists that he never asked for or received cash or gifts from him.
- This article was originally published on page 3 of Sunday Independent on November 08, 2009
|
StumbleUpon
Reddit
Digg
Delicious
Newsvine
Facebook
muti
Twitter
