One of the men accused in the Senzo Meyiwa murder trial has asked the court to intervene so that he could be able to take a warm shower. The Orlando Pirates and Bafana Bafana star was shot dead in October 2014.
Advocate Charles Mnisi, defending the third accused Mthobisi Mncube in the trial, has sought the court’s assistance. There seems to be no hot water for his client to take a proper shower at Kgosi Mampuru II prison in Pretoria, where the accused are held.
He informed the Pretoria High Court about this on Tuesday, before the proceedings began. Mnisi said that his client, Mncube, hasn’t been able to take a bath since Thursday last week.
These concerns arise as the chilly winter weather in Gauteng has intensified over the past few days.
Accused hasn’t had a bath since Thursday
“He says if these conditions continue, then he will find it hard to come to court or to even instruct me,” Mnisi said.
He went on to argue that his client was advised that bathing in cold water would be at his own risk.
Mnisi told the court that Mncube has an injury to one of his arms, and the jail conditions exacerbate the suffering. Accused number five’s legal attorney, advocate Zandile Mshololo, stated that her client is experiencing the same problem with cold water.
The state responded that it will have talks with the management of the centre on Tuesday after the court proceedings.
Meanwhile, Vodacom’s forensic liaison supervisor, Pinky Vythilingam, continued her testimony in the case. She dug deeper into mobile records.
This follows the court’s early adjournment last week due to Vythilingam’s health concerns as she had a persistent cough.
Cellphone records testimony
Leading the evidence, state prosecutor Ronnie Sibanda asked Vythilingam to look over accused number three’s cellphone actions. And she discovered that Mncube and Ntuli communicated numerously.
She said over 5,000 activities were recorded on the number that is linked with Mncube.
“On October 26, 2014 at 13:49:49 an outgoing call was made to the number ending 5787, and that call lasted 47 secs. The tower picked there is Vosloorus. That number belongs to Fisokuhle Ntuli,” said Vythilingam.
Vythilingam said between September 19 2014 and March 4 2015, the MSIDN remained the same, but the IMEI number changed.
Sibanda asked what that means in simple terms and clarified the number of devices that they were able to count that were used.
“It means the same SIM card was inserted into different other handsets. And the SIM card was inserted on five different devices.”
