'Investigating officer told me to escape'
03 Apr 2012 | Sapa
THE Pretoria Magistrate's Court heard yesterday that the investigating officer who was responsible for transporting serial jail escapee Bongani Moyo to and from court was present when he escaped last year.
HOUDINI: Zimbabwean national Bongani Moyo, face covered, arrives in the Pretoria Magistrate's Court in leg irons last October to face, among others, charges of armed robbery. PHOTO: PEGGY NKOMO
Moyo was testifying about his escape from the same court on August 10 2011.
He said that when he walked out of the courtroom, the officer who was responsible for transporting him to and from jail was near him.
Moyo told the court that Warrant Officer Frederick Erasmus was talking to three of his co-accused, not too far from where he was sitting, when he escaped. He said Erasmus had put his co-accused in a cell, but had left him to sit on a bench outside the cells in the court building.
He claimed that shortly before he escaped, Erasmus had threatened to kill him.
"He said I should choose between showing him where Zwane was, if not he would kill me, or that I should just walk out and disappear because he would kill me."
Moyo testified that he told Erasmus he did not know who Zwane was.
Erasmus then apparently walked across to the cells to speak to Moyo's co-accused and allegedly told them that he would kill Moyo.
Moyo said he could not hear Erasmus at the time, but his co-accused, Thabane Sibanda, shouted in their language that Erasmus had just told them he would kill him.
"I got up from the bench, opened the door and walked through court 16 ..."
State prosecutor Werner Gibson asked Moyo why he had not alerted anyone that he was being threatened.
Moyo said Erasmus threatened him after his court appearance. "If he had threatened me before then, I would have raised that issue in court on that day."
Gibson asked why Moyo had not mentioned in his statements to police following his re-arrest that Erasmus was the one who told him to leave the court.
Moyo said he had given the policeman all the information, but that not all of it was in the written statement.
Moyo escaped from Boksburg Prison in March 2011. In August that year, he escaped from the Pretoria Magistrate's Court. Last month, he escaped from Pretoria Central Prison.
The matter was postponed to May 16. - Sapa
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