Pretoria - The so-called “Modimolle monster” Johan Kotze testified on Thursday that he could not remember mutilating his ex-wife's breasts and genitals.
“Your honour these things happened..., but I can't remember what happened that day,” he told the High Court in Pretoria.
Prosecutor Retha Meintjes described Ina Bonnette's injures to Kotze. He either denied inflicting them or said he could not remember doing so.
Meintjes presented a side-cutter, a nail, and a knife to the court and told the court how Kotze had cut off Bonnette's nipples and cut her genitals.
She put it to him that after cutting off parts of Bonnette's nipples, he had pushed a nail into her wounds.
“I never used a nail.... I never had a nail,” Kotze said.
He admitted to being enraged while Bonnette was tied to the bed in his rented Modimolle house on January 3, 2012.
“I know I walked around.... I picked up the (side-cutter) and I was very angry.”
He said he threatened her with it and only remembered seeing blood. He did not realise he had hurt Bonnette until he saw blood. “Then, I stopped.”
He said he had only an image of bleeding from one of Bonnette's breasts.
Meintjes asked him about a coagulant he had used on Bonnette.
“I wanted to help her,” Kotze said.
He said it was used to stop bleeding, but that on second thoughts he would not have used it.
Kotze is accused of orchestrating the gang rape of Bonnette, and of murdering his stepson Conrad, 19.
His co-accused Andries Sithole, Pieta Mohlane, and Frans Mphaka are also charged with kidnapping, assaulting, repeatedly raping, and attempting to murder Bonnette that day.
Bonnette and Kotze's daughter Jo-Marie Kotze sat in the public gallery again on Thursday.
Meintjes asked Kotze why he had not untied Bonnette.
“This was one of the things that bothered me.... I can never think why I didn't untie her.”
Meintjes asked him how he seemed to remember some events, but forget others which happened that day.
Kotze said his memory since New Year's Eve 2011 had been affected. He testified that he saw Bonnette cheating on him.
“This is a condition that is very serious for me,” he said. - Sapa