UK Honeymoon Couple Attacked in S.A.

[Bill]

bobbylondonuk said:

For me, the question is - can the family go on a civil proceeding in the UK courts?

it is not about the freedom of sexual preference etc....it is about - fraudulent heterosexual marriage knowingly entered into by witholding the guys sexual preference from the woman & family. Can they sue for costs and damage?

Really?

[anonymous-user]

rohrl said:

Any chance of her family bringing a civil case?

For wedding costs, no chance of success.

For murder, a la OJ Simpson, dunno.

[anonymous-user]

bobbylondonuk said:

For me, the question is - can the family go on a civil proceeding in the UK courts?

it is not about the freedom of sexual preference etc....it is about - fraudulent heterosexual marriage knowingly entered into by witholding the guys sexual preference from the woman & family. Can they sue for costs and damage?

No. They made no contract with the guy. There is no other cause of action.

[Rude-boy]

Breadvan72 said:

How can people here be so sure of any defendant's guilt without access to all evidence? I think that the presumption of innocence should be more than just a cipher. Usually I really can't tell if someone on trial is guilty or not just by reading media reports. Others seem ready to be very sure, but they have no more info than any of us.

I fully agree with you on this but have to say that it is my 'legal' mind that holds me back, whilst my 'lay' mind is a thousand miles away.

I can see why there are a lot of people who have determined guilt on the basis of what they have seen and read and that is often, as best, a lose précis of the evidence.

Me, I'm just a professional cynic at times and look at what we have been told and keep going back to two very simple questions - Why was he not killed, and why was she not raped or at least sexually assaulted? I am sure that there are many answers to those questions, one of which may even be 'the' answer, but trying to place myself in the minds of a men desperate enough to go as far as the murderers did, yet leave a witness alive (let us assume that the taxi driver was involved or that they sure he would not 'identify' them) and a very attractive female unmolested other than the death blow(s) goes contrary to most of what you would expect given the scenario in play.

[Mermaid]

Breadvan72 said:

There is no other cause of action.

Hope Anni's family realise that, after they have overcome the shock. Or else it will keep costing them money and wear them down.

[TTmonkey]

Breadvan72 said:

How can people here be so sure of any defendant's guilt without access to all evidence? I think that the presumption of innocence should be more than just a cipher. Usually I really can't tell if someone on trial is guilty or not just by reading media reports. Others seem ready to be very sure, but they have no more info than any of us.

Perhaps the three years it took to get him out there with his claims of mental problems have prejudiced people? Appealing deportation orders on medical grounds....

And he clearly led a double life, living a lie to appear normal while all along getting his sexual kicks with a big German fetish dungeon master. Do you think Annie married him knowing all this? Or do you think their relationship was based on decipt and lies? I can't see her being a complicit partner in this double life that he lives.

And if you accept that he lived a complete double life, you can easily accept that he had her killed, with reports ( probably unfounded) of large life insurance policies and money problems in his business.

[Rude-boy]

Regardless of if his actions were right or wrong the defendant would not be the first, nor will they be the last, to enter into a marriage that only one party actually believed in.

[anonymous-user]

His sexuality seems to me irrelevant, and a potential source of unreasoning prejudice.

[mjb1]

Why did the judge halt the trial before Dewani took the stand? Presumably the prosecution were intending him to give evidence, would that not happen before the prosecution side finishes? Does that mean the trial was halted before the prosecution had finished their case?

[Rude-boy]

Breadvan72 said:

His sexuality seems to me irrelevant, and a potential source of unreasoning prejudice.

I'm not sure that we have sufficient information or evidence to say if his sexuality was or was not a factor that had a direct or indirect effect on the death of the defendant's wife.

I believe that some will be making incorrect extrapolations about it on the basis of their prejudices but to ignore that it could be an influencing factor ("I'm gay", "I'm telling Daddy", "Oh not you don't..." or any one of a million variations) would be rash, at least until proven not to be a factor.

Strangely I do not see the defendant's reluctance to return to SA as any sort of indication of guilt. Whilst the truth may be very different I personally would never wish to have to stand trial there, much less for anything that might leave me in a cell over night...

[rs1952]

Breadvan72 said:

How can people here be so sure of any defendant's guilt without access to all evidence? I think that the presumption of innocence should be more than just a cipher. Usually I really can't tell if someone on trial is guilty or not just by reading media reports. Others seem ready to be very sure, but they have no more info than any of us.

This story was covered in South Africa much more widely than it was here, including the bit about his bisexuality which was common knowledge over there a year ago, whilst we heard bugger all about it here.

Locally it was felt that the defence version of events didn't stack up. For example, car hijackings are commonplace in SA, but the hijackers generally don't kidnap people - of they're going to get shot, that happens there and then at the time of the hijacking. The other matter that didn't ring true is that they asked to be taken to Gugulethu late at night. This is about as likely as you inviting some baboons and a couple of chimpanzees around to tea. Even if, naively, they had asked to be taken then your average SA taxi driver would have at least warned them against it and probably asked them to take another cab if they insisted. You would be a lot safer walking down Sauchiehall street late on a Saturday night wearing an England football strip.

I shall be in Cape Town in four weeks time. I'll give an update then if there's anything interesting to add.

[anonymous-user]

mjb1 said:

Why did the judge halt the trial before Dewani took the stand? Presumably the prosecution were intending him to give evidence, would that not happen before the prosecution side finishes? Does that mean the trial was halted before the prosecution had finished their case?

No. The Judge heard the full case for the prosecution. She decided it raised no basis to convict. Unless the law in SA differs on this, the defendant could not be compelled to give evidence. Even if he gave evidence, simply hoping he would incriminate himself is no basis to go forward.

A defendant never gives evidence as part of the prosecution case.

[Slaav]

DJRC said:

Isn't that exactly what I said?

Sorry - yes, in a way!

My point being that I don't think she thought it was a whole load of buggery but that it simply wasn't robust enough (for teh reasosn stated) to stand up to a challenge on appeal if he were found guilty.

[JF87]

Another curious nugget of circumstance: a family friend of the Dewanis' was murdered in an (unsolved) carjacking in South Africa a couple of years previously. Interesting that the taxi driver allegedly recruited to bump off Anni said that Dewani had 'boasted' to him of organising a previous unsolved carjacking hit, presumably in order to convince the driver of the plan's infallibility.

Obviously Dewani hadn't organised the previous hit - at best, police think it might have given him the idea and a modus operandum. And of course the taxi driver could have invented the 'boast' - though on the face of it, that would have been a pretty lucky bit of coincidental storytelling on his part.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...

[JF87]

To be fair, you didn't just think it. Blame the words & deeds police.

[Pints]

JF87 said:

Another curious nugget of circumstance: a family friend of the Dewanis' was murdered in an (unsolved) carjacking in South Africa a couple of years previously. Interesting that the taxi driver allegedly recruited to bump off Anni said that Dewani had 'boasted' to him of organising a previous unsolved carjacking hit, presumably in order to convince the driver of the plan's infallibility.

Obviously Dewani hadn't organised the previous hit - at best, police think it might have given him the idea and a modus operandum. And of course the taxi driver could have invented the 'boast' - though on the face of it, that would have been a pretty lucky bit of coincidental storytelling on his part.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaan...

So had he (Dewani) or had he not previously been to South Africa?
I thought it was established that the honeymoon was his first time in the country.

[anonymous-user]

Rude-boy said:

Breadvan72 said:

His sexuality seems to me irrelevant, and a potential source of unreasoning prejudice.

I'm not sure that we have sufficient information or evidence to say if his sexuality was or was not a factor that had a direct or indirect effect on the death of the defendant's wife.

I believe that some will be making incorrect extrapolations about it on the basis of their prejudices but to ignore that it could be an influencing factor ("I'm gay", "I'm telling Daddy", "Oh not you don't..." or any one of a million variations) would be rash, at least until proven not to be a factor.

Strangely I do not see the defendant's reluctance to return to SA as any sort of indication of guilt. Whilst the truth may be very different I personally would never wish to have to stand trial there, much less for anything that might leave me in a cell over night...

The Judge found the Defendant's sexuality to be irrelevant. She had more information than we have.

I agree that reluctance to be extradited is not an indication of guilt. Also, the mental illness was sufficient for Dewani to be sectioned at one point, but not sufficient to make him unfit to be tried.

[JF87]

Pints said:

So had he (Dewani) or had he not previously been to South Africa?
I thought it was established that the honeymoon was his first time in the country.

Yes, he'd never been there before. All explained in the link provided.

The point isn't that he might have been involved in this previous fatal carjacking - which he quite obviously wasn't - but rather how the taxi driver he supposedly recruited to bump his wife off would apparently know about this earlier murder unless Dewani had told him.

Re sexuality, available evidence to me points to him being gay rather than bisexual. Plenty of male lovers crawling out of the woodwork, but no female. He certainly wasn't trawling straight domination porn sites in the days before and after his wife's murder. The emphasis on bisexuality seems to have been transmitted only by him and his defence team. Historically it's been a regular gambit for gay men who feel obliged - for cultural or commercial reasons - to cling on to a veneer of heterosexuality (all the way from Elton John to Tom Daley). Sad but true.

[Pints]

JF87 said:

Yes, he'd never been there before. All explained in the link provided.

The point isn't that he might have been involved in this previous fatal carjacking - which he quite obviously wasn't - but rather how the taxi driver he supposedly recruited to bump his wife off would apparently know about this earlier murder unless Dewani had told him.

This was being reported in South African news soon after the event. My in-laws were immediately convinced he was guilty because he'd previously been in the country to organise a killing - or so it had been reported.
That the taxi driver knew of the earlier murder, doesn't necessarily mean it was Dewani who had told him.

[anonymous-user]

Maybe taxi drivers read newspapers.