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The reopened inquest into Ahmed Timol’s death continued today with former state security officer Joao Rodrigues taking the stand, after telling the court yesterday he had witnessed Timol “diving” through the window from room 1026 on the 10th floor at John Vorster Square.
Rodrigues claims he was the last person to see Timol alive, and that he was merely performing administrative duties at the building the day of Timol’s death.
Advocate Torie Pretorius, the attorney representing the state in the reopened inquest, grilled Rodrigues at the North Johannesburg High Court in Pretoria this morning, asking pertinent questions surrounding the death of Ahmed Timol.
Yesterday, Rodrigues told the court that it was his first visit to the infamous building in 1971 when he was tasked with giving out salary cheques to police officers. The cheques he had were for officers Hans Gloy and JZ van Niekerk, who were on duty when they were overseeing Timol.
Rodrigues made his way up to the 10th floor and waited outside room 1026, where Timol was being detained. According to him, he had taken in three cups of coffee for them after another police officer passed the tray to him. When he entered the room, he handed them their coffee and gave Gloy and Van Niekerk their salary cheques.
It was at that moment that a certain Mr X entered the room, informing them that various other co-conspirators had been caught and detained and Gloy and Van Niekerk left the room immediately. They asked Rodrigues to watch Timol.
Rodrigues told the court yesterday that Timol had asked him to take him to the bathroom, which he thought was “a reasonable request”.
As he got up from the table, he walked to the right hand side of the table and pushed a chair under the table and at that very moment, he saw a “movement from the side of his eye”.
It was then that Timol had managed to open the window and “dive” out of the window, a statement he kept to in today’s court session.
When Pretorius probed Rodrigues about knowing Colonel Greyling prior to visiting John Vorster Square, Rodrigues denied knowing him.
“After the incident where Ahmed Timol left the window, is it not so that your previous evidence said that you went to Colonel Greyling?” Pretorius asked.
“I knew him after the incident,” Rodrigues replied.
“So at the time of the incident after you looked through the window, when did you meet up with Colonel Greyling?” Pretorius asked.
“When Timol jumped over the window I went out of the office into the passage and I started screaming, saying that Timol has jumped out of the window. People came out of their offices. As much as I’ve already mentioned that what transpired on that day in question. Thereafter we peeked through that window and everybody went down to the ground floor where Timol was lying,” Rodrigues said.
Judge Billy Mothle, who is the presiding judge on this case, asked Rodrigues if it was then that Colonel Greyling introduced himself. “Yes, he came up to me and said he’s Colonel Greyling.”
“And then what happened next? Did you get to know him?” Pretorius asked.
“No, I wasn’t friends with him.”
Pretorius also questioned Rodrigues about his name, after publishing several books under the name “Jan” Rodrigues and not “Joao”.
“You didn’t try to get away from your past, did you?” Pretorius asked.
Rodrigues looked confused.
“From my past? I don’t understand the question,” he said.
Rodrigues also told the court that Gloy and Van Niekerk tried to influence his testimony given into the original inquest, saying that he was forced to give “false” information.
After lunch, Pretorius went through Professor Steve Naidoo’s testimony from last week, when as an expert forensic pathologist, he told the court about the extent of Timol’s injuries, most of which he had sustained before he fell to his death.
Pretorius handed Rodrigues two A4 pieces of paper which had sketches of Timol’s injuries, and questioned him about the injuries, given that in yesterday’s testimony he told the court that he had seen no injuries on Timol.
“Mr Rodrigues it would seem that in the lower leg there was quite extensive injuries. Can you see there in diagram B where it’s depicted?”
“Ja I see.”
“And if you turn over you see the left ankle again, you see contusions or bruising as it’s called.”
“Ja I see.”
“You don’t perhaps know where that comes from?” Pretorius asked.
Laughing, Rodrigues replied that he was not involved in any torture of the detainees.
“I was never involved. I don’t know where those injuries were sustained,” he said.
Pretorius continued to grill Rodrigues about his initial affidavit given in the original inquest and statements given in court yesterday, saying that there were “serious discrepancies” in Rodrigues’ answers today.
The inquest continues tomorrow morning at 10am.
