Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — UNKNOWN

MR DORFLING: Mr Chairman, may I just revert to paragraph 4.2 of my learned friend's submission, the submission that is made here is,
"The shots which were fired in the direction of Shell House included shots fired from AK47s, handguns and at least one shotgun."
Now, as I see sketch 1, reference is made to four bullets that hit Shell House that might have emanated from the crowd, SW3, 4, 5 and 6, if Mr Berger is in agreement with me that that is the position, then paragraph 4.2 on the ballistics report as far as SW3 and SW 5 is concerned, the experts were of the opinion that that might have been emanating from a handgun, SW6 from a military type of weapon possibly, and 5.56 which was an R4/R5 calibre, and SW4, probably an AK47.  I find on that bullet marks against Shell House no evidence of any shotguns.  I also do not find any evidence of AK47s, in other words in the plural.  There's one AK47 and no mention of shotguns, unless he's referring to some other bullet -  shots that hit Shell House.

MR BERGER: Thank you, Chairperson, let me put it into perspective.  My learned friend, Mr Dorfling, is quite correct when he looks at sketch plan 2 that the shots which actually hit Shell House were - no, no, sketch plan 2, Chairperson, at page 183, that's the one that Mr Dorfling was referring to.

MR DORFLING: Sorry I said 1, but I was looking at 2, it's indeed sketch plan 2.

MR BERGER: Mr Dorfling is quite correct that what sketch plan 2 shows are four shots which actually hit Shell House, two from handguns, those being the two blue lines, one from an AK47 and then one from a "handwapen of 'n geweer", but that's not what paragraph 4.2 says.  4.2 says that shots were fired in the direction of Shell House included AK47s, handguns and at least one shotgun.  Now where one gets that from is one has to look at sketch plan 2 together with sketch plan 4.  If one looks at sketch plan 4 on page 185, one will see the following, if one looks at the yellow arrow marked "BN3", do you have that Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR BERGER: Now "BN3" is a shotgun, you will see in the key that the yellow is "haelgeweer" and those shots were fired as we say in the memorandum, in the direction of Shell House.  They never hit Shell House because they got caught underneath the balcony in De Villiers Street, and that is depicted there by that yellow line.  Do you see that Chairperson?  That is the shotgun that is being referred to in paragraph 4.2 of the memorandum.  As far as the AK47s in the plural is concerned, the first AK47 that I'm referring to is to be seen in sketch plan 2, in particular the shot marked "SW4", and the other AK47 that I'm referring to is to be seen in sketch plan 4 at page 185.  Chairperson you will see in King George Street, what the sketch plans move - the orientation changes, and here what we see in sketch plan 4 is King George Street between De Villiers and on the right-hand side would be "Noord" and right up in the corner there near the corner of King George and De Villiers there are two shots marked 17 and 18, do you have that Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR BERGER: And those two shots are fired from an AK47 and the direction as was testified to by Superintendent Du Plessis when he gave his evidence was in the direction of the Shell House.  It never hit Shell House, but was in the direction of Shell House.

MR DORFLING: Can I just perhaps respond as far as the shotgun shots are concerned.  These shots could not be linked to the events of the day if I understand the evidence correctly and at this point in time as far as the other AK47 shot or shots is concerned, 17 and 18, they hit the actual balcony underneath the building where Jabu's Bakery is situated, they did not hit Shell House.  If they were fired - if my learned friend tries to convey that they were fired generally towards where Shell House was situated, it goes no higher than that, and at this point in time I'm not sure whether they are indeed linked to the events of the day in any event.  I think those were also two new shots, I'm not exactly sure about those two, but at least the shotgun shots cannot particularly be linked to the events of the day.

CHAIRPERSON: As I understand, Mr Berger, what he's saying in regard to shots 17 and 18 is simply that they were fired in the general direction of, but they did not reach Shell House.

MR DORFLING: That's the way I understood it, what ...(intervention)

JUDGE NGCOBO: ...(inaudible)

MR DORFLING: Yes, yes, I think the point I'm trying to convey, Mr Justice Ngcobo is whether these shots could be linked to the events of the day.  There are a number of shots recorded that was only recorded after the day and which can't in particular be linked to the events of the day, it might have happened beforehand, it might have happened after the event, and I think that's the - paragraph 4.2 seemed to give out that this might relate to the day of the 28th of March '94, and it isn't necessarily correct.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, thank you.  Perhaps I need to take a step backwards.  When Superintendent Du Plessis conducted his investigation on the 29th of March 1994 he testified that he was unable to conduct a very extensive investigation.  He only investigated the area in King George Street roundabout the Woburn Pharmacy and the area in De Villiers Street as depicted on sketch plan 1, underneath Jabu's Bakery.  In fact if one looks at sketch plan 1, one sees represented diagrammatically the extent of Superintendent Du Plessis's investigation, and he conceded that his investigation went no further than that.  When there was the joint investigation as is shown in sketch plans 2, 3 and 4, the experts were far more extensive and found many more bullet holes in the vicinity.  They went down De Villiers Street, they went further, they went higher, they went all around Shell House, they went further north in De Villiers Street and they found a whole lot of holes.  There were certain holes which they found which were not depicted on photographs which Superintendent Du Plessis took at the time, and those particular bullet holes, they were able to exclude as having appeared on the day of the incident, but those bullet holes are not the bullet holes that I'm referring to now, there were two or three of those if I remember correctly.
...(inaudible)

MR BERGER: Yes, they were the shots from King George Street, handgun shots, into Jabu's Bakery, in the region of shots - I'm looking not at sketch plan 4, shots 11, 12 and 13 in that area.

JUDGE NGCOBO: Were these shots excluded simply because they did not appear in the photographs taken by Du Plessis?

MR BERGER: That is so, yes.

JUDGE NGCOBO: Was there a suggestion that perhaps they may have been - they may have occurred perhaps after the photographer?

MR BERGER: That is correct, yes.

MR DORFLING: Yes, Mr Chair, if I may at this point in time, if one moves on to paragraph 4.3 what is said there is,
"The shots which were fired in the direction of the marchers included shots fired from AK47 and handguns."
As far as the AK47 shots are concerned, the only possible shot that was recorded as having been emanating from the marchers on the day, which Superintendent Du Plessis found on the 29th of March, or the only three shots are shots numbers "SW3", "SW4" and "SW6", those were the only three shots that was found by Superintendent Du Plessis on the 29th of March, of which one can therefor be certain in all probability emanated from the crowd of marchers.  If one has regard to the actual report "SW3" is possibly a shot from a handgun, "SW6" possibly from a military type kind of weapon and "SW4" a large calibre firearm and the probability of an AK47 could not be excluded.

MR BERGER: Mr Dorfling, with respect, you seem to have misread 4.3, it refers to shots at the marchers.