The presiding magistrate over the bail application based on new facts of alleged wife killer, Arnold Terblanche, has been “misled in a spectacular and unforgivable manner.”
These were the words of Terblanche’s defense attorney, Peter Daubermann, during the continuation of the bail application in the Gqeberha Magistrate’s Court yesterday, November 2.
Daubermann spent hours in the courtroom digging into the bail opposing affidavit of investigating officer, Col. Rhynhardt Swanepoel, labelling him as someone who, along with the state, misled magistrate Kriban Pillay.
According to Daubermann, Swanepoel had said that he has evidence for every single piece of information conveyed in his opposing affidavit, including what transpired at a meeting between Terblanche and one of his co-accused, Reinhardt Leach on October 12 last year, a few days before Terblanche’s estranged wife, Vicki, was murdered.
Daubermann referred to Swanepoel’s affidavit where he claimed that it was during this meeting that the two conspired to murder Vicki, however, the state has no evidence of what transpired since there was no witness to say what happened at the meeting. “The state has zero evidence as to what transpired at that meeting. Swanepoel and the state misled the court with regards to the nature and extent of the evidence that they have. There is every reason to doubt what Swanepoel said because what is in the affidavit is an inference that he has drawn from evidence at his disposal,” Daubermann said.
“This proves that Swanepoel resorted to sheer, absolute speculation and misled you. Now you know that the state has no evidence.”
He continued to refer to messages sent by Leach to Terblanche where he allegedly asked Terblanche’s help for a fast car to get “ysters” (firearms) in Cape Town. “Swanepoel, by means of innuendo, intended to say that this was for the purpose of committing the murder but the truth is that the reference to ‘fast car’ and ‘ysters’ is misunderstood by Swanepoel.
“The full transcript is only now available and Leach added that he had to do a favour for someone by fetching the ‘ysters.’ This means that Leach did it for a third party and not the applicant (Terblanche). Swanepoel was selective with this information,” he added.
Daubermann continued to claim that Terblanche had told Leach that he wanted “nothing to do with any of this,” but that Swanepoel was once again being selective with this information.
“The applicant distanced himself from this situation. Swanepoel suggests in the affidavit that the discussion surrounding the fast car was for the murder but you were misled because the evidence does not support that and Swanepoel has not explained why he quoted selectively from the communications,” Daubermann told Pillay.
He also referred to another message sent by Leach to Terblanche on October 20 last year, two days after Vicki was killed on October 18. In the message, Leach allegedly told Terblanche that Vicki insists that she can see spirits and want to tell people’s fortunes because she was high on drugs. He claimed that they had an argument the night before, on October 19, when she was supposed to already be dead.
“Leach was pretending to the applicant that he still saw the deceased alive on the 19th but we know that this is false since she was already murdered on the 18th. It is simply inconceivable that he would send that voice note to the applicant and pretend that the deceased was alive if they had conspired together to murder her.
“If the applicant had paid Leach to murder the deceased, Leach would have let him know that he killed her, not pretend that she was still alive,” Daubermann said.
The bail application continues today, November 3.
Terblanche, Leach and Dylan Cullis face several charges after Vicki Terblanche’s body was found in a shallow grave in Greenbushes in October last year.
