Johannesburg - Information supplied to the police by a confidant of the twins who have been accused of terrorism, as well as items found inside their Joburg homes, led to their arrests.
State witness Ronaldo Smith also allegedly attempted to travel to Turkey and ultimately Syria to join Islamic State with Brandon-Lee and Tony-Lee Thulsie.
But when Smith’s home was raided on the same day as the twins, he turned State witness and confessed several details to police about the twins’ alleged terrorism plot.
This included that one of them was building an explosive device and looking for a trigger mechanism to set it off.
The revelations were made by Hawks Detective Warrant Officer Wynand Olivier, who testified in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Monday about the legality of the twins’ arrests and detention.
The twins’ lawyer, advocate Annelene van den Heever, argued last week that officers had only search warrants and not arrest warrants when they took them into custody three weeks ago.
The court heard that the matter needed to be finalised before a bail application was heard. If it can be proved that they were arrested illegally, they must be released.
On Monday, Olivier told the court that he became aware of the twins’ activities in May last year when he received information that they were thwarted from boarding a plane to Turkey, where he believed they were going to enter Syria and join Islamic State.
The investigating officer said he monitored the Thulsies’ and Smith’s Facebook accounts, and he testified that some of their posts appeared to support the terrorist organisation.
He added that he received information from international agencies that someone using the pseudonym “Simba” was in contact with another person, who had strong links to Islamic State, about detonating an explosive device in South Africa.
Olivier said he applied for a search warrant for the homes of the trio but not for an arrest warrant as they were only at an investigation stage at the time.
However, when police arrived at Smith’s home, he told them that he was willing to co-operate as he was no longer interested in joining Islamic State.
He confirmed that “Simba” was Tony-Lee and that he had tried to convince him to abandon his alleged terrorism plan.
Olivier said Smith had requested to be placed in witness protection but left after a few days.
Olivier testified that, based on Smith’s information and items at the twins’ homes, which included a folder on how to make bombs and how to execute terrorist attacks, a decision was made to arrest the siblings.
Van den Heever slammed Olivier’s testimony and argued that the Thulsies wanted to travel to Turkey because they were to be interviewed about possibly immigrating there.
She also argued that authorities had misconstrued a lot of the content posted on the twins’ Facebook page.
The Thulsies are due to appear in court again on Thursday, when the case of the legality of their arrests is expected to continue.
The Star