Special Hearings — Mandela United Football Club Hearings — 1997-11-24

MP PIGOU: Okay.  Thank you.  Let's go to page 30 there where you I believe go and see Kuki's mother and she says to you that she was informed some time in March 1989 by Zinzi Mandela that her child was missing and that she may be overseas in Lusaka?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: Sorry you said page 30?

MP PIGOU: Ja page 30, 3-0.  Do you see that?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: Ja that's correct.

MP PIGOU: Okay.  Was any attempt made to speak to Zinzi Mandela about this, the disappearance of Kuki?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No, no, no attempts were made.

MP PIGOU: Did, in perhaps a wider context, were any attempts made to speak to Mrs Madikizela-Mandela about these allegations?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No attempts were made to speak to anybody at that stage.

MP PIGOU: Could you perhaps tell us why that is the case?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: Because what Jerry Richardson had told us was hearsay and he would refuse to give me a statement in connection with this matter and I couldn't go and get a warrant or anything from anybody to sort this problem out.

MP PIGOU: On page 16 Snr Supt Moodley there is an entry in the second paragraph that you visit the Soweto Murder and Robbery and speak to Lt Col Dempsey about Meadowlands docket 236/11/88, that is the Sono disappearance, kidnapping docket which was going to be put on to the computer and in this docket there is prima facie evidence that Winnie Mandela was directly involved in the abduction of Lolo Sono and - it says Sibusiso there, Shabalala, in the light of that entry made by Colonel Hesslinga could you tell me why no attempt was made to approach Mrs Madikizela-Mandela?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: That docket was already dealt with by the attorney general and with Col Dempsey at the time during the trial, at that stage the attorney general refused or declined to prosecute and go further.  When I went back to him he gave me the same story and he said unless you have a body and if you've got any fresh evidence come back to me and I will do something about it.

MP PIGOU: So the attorney general told you that you had to have a body to proceed on this matter?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: That's correct, yes.

MP PIGOU: Okay.  Could you just tell us, because I am sure you are waiting for this question, where is the docket?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: As far as I recall I have given the docket to the attorney general, it's somewhere in the system, I don't know where it is at the moment.

MP PIGOU: And would you if you had handed the docket to the attorney general have received a receipt for handing that over?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No not necessarily.

MP PIGOU: Wouldn't there be some form of register in which dockets were handed over?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No we had no registers.

MP PIGOU: So there's no control - are you telling me the system has no such controls in determining where a particular docket may be at any one time?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: What system are we talking about?

MP PIGOU: Well the system that you were talking about, it's lost in the system somewhere.

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: When I talk system I am talking between the police force, the justice department.

MP PIGOU: Well that's the system I am talking about.

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No we don't have.

MP PIGOU: I see.

YASMINE SOOKA: I am sorry, I just want to understand this, sorry Chair, you are saying that there is no control mechanism when a docket goes from the police to the Attorney General, so if someone was to ask at any stage where the docket was there's no real record, is that the explanation you are proffering?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: Let me rectify the situation.  From my office, where we were then working in a temporary situation, if you went to Dempsey's office today you will find a court book, if you came to my office where I was working as a branch commander you would find a court book.  We were a temporary unit just set up to do this investigation.  We didn't have a court book as such, that's what I am trying to say.  So in other words we didn't have a document as such.  That's what I am saying.

YASMINE SOOKA: Why not?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: And if you ask me why I won't be able to answer that.

YASMINE SOOKA: I am sorry Mr Moodley I am not really trying to be difficult, I am trying to understand in the circumstances even where you have this kind of unit, you are telling me that because you were temporary there is no record kept of when a docket passes from you to the Attorney General or to any other unit for that matter?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: I am telling you that, yes.

MP PIGOU: Thank you.  Could you tell us Snr Supt Moodley why it would appear from the information that you have provided to us, and I hope you can correct me on it, there is no statement taken from Mr Jerry Richardson from all this information that he was providing?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: Jerry Richardson, first of all we were there with a tape recorder, we asked if we can tape him, he refused to have himself taped or to make a verbal statement to us, in writing, he made a verbal statement but didn't want to reduce it to writing.

MP PIGOU: Okay.  And were any attempts made as were in the case of Mr Mbatha and Mr Dhlamini to bug the cells that they were in so that during the course of your conversation with Mr Richardson you would be able to have transcripts at a later stage?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: That's correct.

MP PIGOU: Sorry, let me get it clear, I know you did it for Mbatha and Dhlamini and you bugged the cells through the legal channels and got transcripts made up and so forth and that was put in your investigation diary, did you make any attempt, because of the resistance or reluctance of Mr Jerry Richardson to do the same thing so you would have at least some sort of recording of conversations with him?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No we did not.

MP PIGOU: Could you tell me why that is the case, because all we have is your and your colleagues say-so on this matter at the moment.  We have no signed statements, we have nothing.

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No we approached the man, he was giving us information.

MP PIGOU: Just in terms of Mr Richardson's informer status, I believe there's an entry in here again page 16 as speaking - Mr Hesslinga talking to a Lt Col Muller, three paragraphs up from the bottom there, were you able - this is Col Muller for NID in Soweto - were you able to establish irrefutably that Jerry Richardson was an informer?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No I didn't do any investigations regarding that, no.

MP PIGOU: But from your conversations perhaps with your colleague, because this is Colonel Hesslinga's entry, did Colonel Hesslinga inform you whether he had established with documents that Jerry Richardson was an informer?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: No there was no documents.  We went to look for documents there were no documents available.

MP PIGOU: So you are saying that the money was handed over on the basis of the Kuki Zwane information that that established his bona fides?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: That he was going to help us - we didn't know at that stage what murder it was, after we found it was Kuki Zwane murder.

MP PIGOU: And did you establish from anyone else in Soweto from security branch members that Jerry Richardson had been an informer?

HOOTHRA MOODLEY: To my best knowledge I think Col Hesslinga did that, there was somebody to confirm that with him.