At the end of a full day of Judge Meyer Joffe's judgment in the Jackie Selebi corruption trial, there was still no indication whether the former police chief would be found guilty.
Selebi, solemnly stern in a light grey suit, and his adversary, fiery chief prosecutor Gerrie Nel, remained silent and unemotional throughout the day yesterday.
Neither was prepared to comment on their feelings before Judge Joffe began reading out his summing up of the vast amount of information he had to consider in his judgment.
For several hours the judge laid out the evidence put before him over the 51-day trial, occasionally stopping to sip water or ask both prosecution and defence if he could simply refer to a particular document rather than read through its entirety.
Judge Joffe outlined the charges against Selebi, who stands accused of corruption for taking more than R1,2 million in cash and gifts from his druglord friend Glenn Agliotti and others, and of defeating the ends of justice.
He said Agliotti, the State's main witness, was a large man of imposing physical appearance, well-spoken and not lacking in confidence.
"He travelled all over the world, stayed at the best hotels, always flew first or business class and made it clear that he liked the better things in life," Judge Joffe said.
"The accused taught at various schools before becoming involved in politics, and again taught for a while when in exile in Tanzania. He was elected to the national office of the ANC and in 1994 he became a back-bencher in Parliament and was later appointed as national police commissioner," was how he described Selebi.
"This judgment deals in essence on the nature of the relationship between them."
Handing down his judgment in the Johannesburg High Court's courtroom 4B, Judge Joffe said that for the court to make a decision, the State had to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt and that both Agliotti and Selebi's versions had to be thoroughly analysed.
He ruled that DVD evidence of Agliotti speaking about a conspiracy against Selebi, and in which he stated that he never gave his friend "Jacks" any money, was admissible. The State had argued that the recording had been made by the police on an undertaking that the meeting was off the record.
He went through all the witnesses that had testified, pointing out that of all the State's witnesses the defence had attacked only Agliotti and his former fiancee, Dianne Muller.
Agliotti claimed to have taken Selebi and his family on lavish shopping sprees, claiming to have bought shoes for Selebi at Harrods in London and Hong Kong, and suits for him at Gray's in Sandton, and splashed out on a R10 000 shiny red designer bag for Selebi's wife on her birthday. Muller backed up Agliotti's stories about having bought clothes for Selebi's sons from designer store Fubu.
Selebi has maintained that he has never received anything other than a Swiss Army knife from Agliotti.
Judge Joffe said that for the court to make a decision, the State was required to present its case beyond reasonable doubt, while there was no onus on the defence to prove anything other than to present a version that could be "reasonably, possibly true".
This, he said, was to preclude the innocent from being convicted, and he would be "bound to acquit" if there was a reasonable possibility that the defence's evidence could be true.
Judgment continues today.