Motata trial postponed

2007-11-13 16:53

Johannesburg - Pretoria High Court Judge Nkola Motata was given another chance on Tuesday to try and block a court from hearing recordings of his alleged drunken diatribes after a car accident.

This was after Nkola's drunk-driving trial was postponed in the Johannesburg Magistrate's court until July 2 2008 when it will proceed for a full month.

The postponement of the case came after Magistrate Desmond Nair turned down an application by the defence to temporarily block the court from listening to recordings of Motata's alleged drunken diatribe.

Last week Nair ruled that five audio recordings of Motata after his car accident could be heard as part of a trial-within-a-trial to determine their admissibility.

The defence then applied for a postponement in order to give them time to have Nair's ruling reviewed by the high court.

Nair turned down the application for a specific postponement to allow a high court review.

However, Nair said he would postpone the trial anyway in the hope that by conducting it in a single block of time, it would "ensure continuity" and be resolved speedily.

"What we have decided is to place the matter in the manner in which matters are placed on the high court role. We have now placed it for a full month of the court from the 2nd of July," said Nair.

"There is no other way," he said.

High court review

Defence advocate Danie Dorfling confirmed to Sapa the defence would now use the postponement time to apply for a high court review anyway.

He said although the defence was not yet sure exactly when it would proceed with the review application, it would try and get the review ruling completed before the trial resumed again.

Earlier Magistrate Nair said he was turning down the application for a specific postponement to allow the review to try and prevent the defence from making the case obstructive.

"The question that I must answer is when can a party rely on these provisions of review? What is clear is that this is not an absolute right. The accused does not have a free hand to do so ...[allowing the application] will amount to an abuse of the process of review."

Considerable delays

Nair said there had been considerable delays in the matter and trial dates had been postponed on an ongoing basis.

"There have been no fewer than five applications I have had to give rulings on," he said.

"The bulk of the [court transcript] so far has been made up of argument. We have not gone through even 50% of the state witnesses [testimony].

However, later in court, when announcing the postponement, Nair said he considered the trial not to have been unduly delayed.

"I would not come to the conclusion that [the trial] has been an extraordinary period of time"

"I am fully aware that matters [in the magistrate's court] sometimes have an average lifespan of over a year or two years."

Speaking outside court, defence attorney Marinus Van Jaarsveld said there were "no delays" and "no blame" about how long the case was taking.

He said his client was not getting any special treatment by the courts.

"He's been dealt with exactly the same as any other accused," said Van Jaarsveld.

- SAPA