Special Hearings — Legal Hearings — 1997-10-27

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Mr Ebrahim.

MR EBRAHIM: Thank you Chairperson and fellow Commissioners and colleagues.
 We felt it important to highlight the Trojan Horse case because it represents in some respects a turning of the tables on the Security establishment and it shows how judges exercised their discretion when it was the Security Forces that had been on trial.
 The Commission is aware of and has heard evidence of the police operation on the 15th October 1985 that subsequently gained notoriety as the Trojan Horse tragedy which had claimed the lives of Shaun Magmoet, then 16 years old, Michael Miranda, then 11 years old and Jonathan Claasen, then 18 years old. We want to say that this particular insert is dedicated to the memories of Shaun, Michael and Jonathan and other victims of violation of human rights by the police and Security Forces in particular.
 It is dedicated to those like Shaun, Michael and Jonathan who were hardly adults, let alone activists and yet they had become targets of the Apartheid Regime. 
 We will submit that in this particular case it is a tragic example of how our justice system at the time from the police right through to the highest court in this country had failed it's citizens by not protecting them from the excesses of the executive and its administration. Also the absence of the rule of law had not merely failed citizens of the country but they permitted the grotesque ...(indistinct) of the apartheid security machine's capacity to ever increasing levels of violence and brutality.
 Although the deaths resulting from the police brutality, evidenced by the Trojan Horse case may not be considered remarkable within the context of human rights violations that were pervading the country at that time, in 1985 and 1986, but it is the nature of that operation that acquired new and sinister significance as a means of oppression. The Apartheid Regime, despite arming itself with draconian security legislation an over-zealous police force and prosecuting authority, a compliant bench, we would submit, it was beginning to publicly engage in new guerrilla-type sting operations against the rebelling communities and in particular against the youth.
 For the convenience of the Commission we would just want to highlight the salient features of the planning and execution of the Trojan Horse operation and then perhaps proceed to make some comments on the exercise of the judicial discretion in the trial itself and the assumptions made by the trial judge. 
 The salient features of the Trojan Horse matter for those who do not know was as follows: 
 On the 15th October 1985 in an attempt to quell burgeoning unrest in Athlone, a densely populated area in Cape Town, a railway delivery truck loaded with large wooden crates, and in which eight policemen armed with shotguns and side arms were concealed was sent on patrol. To all outward appearances the vehicle was an ordinary delivery vehicle meant to elicit the attention of stone-throwers as a soft target. By virtue of the police on the vehicle being armed only with shotguns loaded with lethal triple A ammunition and side arms and no teargas or lighter crowd control birdshot, it was apparent that the intended response to any attack upon that truck was to be punitive and lethal.
 On it's first pass along Thornton Road the truck had failed to attract the attention of anybody. On it's second pass it was stoned by members of a crowd and the crowd was estimated in size to be between 50 and 200, however as soon as the stoning of that truck commenced the policemen, who had been concealed on the back of the truck, stood up and commenced indiscriminately firing into the crowd with their shotguns even before the truck had stopped. No warning shots had been fired and at the end of a continuous fusillade of shotgun fire, in an approximately 360 degree radius lasting approximately 17 to 20 seconds, 39 rounds had been fired. 
 As a result of that shooting Shaun Magmoed, Michael Miranda and Jonathan Claasen were killed, on the spot, and at least 15 other people were wounded. People were arrested at the scene by the police subsequently included some of those who were injured were subsequently prosecuted for public violence at a trial . . .

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, I don't want to interrupt you, I want to find out how much more you have got because we have got the submission of the Minister to come and then there is a panel discussion. Ten more minutes.

MR EBRAHIM: I will try to be brief.

CHAIRPERSON: No I mean in total.