APARTHEID-ERA

security branch police officer Nick Deetlefs, with a friend who refused to give her name, has faced a grilling at the reopening of the inquest into anti-apartheid activist Neil Aggett’s 1982 death at John Vorster Square police station. Deetlefs’s testimony that he did not physically assault anyone has been branded a lie.

THE National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has charged that there were too many coincidences in the apartheid police’s claim that anti-apartheid activist Neil Aggett killed himself in custody for it to be probable.

Yesterday, the NPA was grilling former security branch police officer Nick Deetlefs at the reopened inquest into Aggett’s 1982 death at the John Vorster Square police station while he was in detention.

His body was found hanging after days of interrogation and torture.

Deetlefs is among the interrogators who are accused of having tortured political activists, and is one of the security officers who interrogated Aggett before he died.

Yesterday, the NPA’s Jabulani Mlotshwa

said the coincidences around Aggett’s claimed suicide weakened its plausibility.

“Firstly, it is the items that are in the cells that Aggett could have used to hang himself with.

“Secondly, there was suddenly three hours of non-visiting to the cells whereas visits were done hourly,” Mlotshwa said.

An inventory inspection in Aggett’s cell found a tie, five pairs of socks and a scarf with which he hanged himself, despite the detainees being not allowed to keep any items that they could hang themselves with.

Deetlefs admitted it was puzzling how the items were found in Aggett’s cell despite the routine checks that were made in cells.

Mlotshwa said it was more irregular given Deetlefs’s claim that he detected and reported his suicidal tendencies from the time he interrogated him.

“If what you are telling us is true, it would mean he was given every tool to hang himself with,” he said.

Deetlefs was yesterday cornered to explain why he gave different dates in his numerous statements on his recollection on the dates on which he claimed Aggett died.

Mlotshwa pushed Deetlefs to also explain why he said Aggett died on February 1, 1982 in his statement dated 2000, while he agreed with the official record of his death on February 5 in his affidavit to the inquest, to which he said was a mistake.

Mlotshwa said the date of Aggett’s death was crucial because he lodged a complaint of torture against his chief interrogator Lieutenant Whitehead the day before he was found dead.

The NPA concludes its cross-examination of Deetlefs today.