Robert McBride wins drunk driving appeal
March 28 2013 at 03:55pm
By SAPA
By SAPA
INLSA
Former Ekhuruleni
metro police chief Robert McBride. File picture: Cara Viereckl
Johannesburg - Former Ekurhuleni
metro police chief Robert McBride has won his appeal against a conviction of
drunken driving and attempting to obstruct justice.
The High Court in Pretoria on Thursday
concluded he was not guilty on all charges.
“The appeal against conviction on both
counts is upheld,” Judges Cynthia Pretorius and Lettie Molopa-Sethosa said in
their written judgment.
“The appellant is found not guilty on
all charges and is discharged.”
McBride was arrested in 2006 after
crashing his official car on the R511 following a Christmas party.
Earlier this month, the two judges
reserved judgment in McBride's appeal against his conviction, as well as his
five-year jail sentence.
In September 2011, a Pretoria regional
magistrate sentenced McBride to two years imprisonment for driving under the
influence of alcohol and an effective three years imprisonment for attempting
to obstruct the course of justice.
Initially three of McBride's colleagues
made statements supporting his version that he had not been drunk and did not
leave the scene of the accident to evade justice.
However, five months later they
testified that he had been heavily under the influence of alcohol and
systematically set about covering this up with their assistance.
In his appeal, McBride argued the three
former colleagues had themselves been intimidated into changing their story.
They were under investigation by the Organised Crime Unit (OCU) in a separate
attempted murder matter and had been offered indemnity in exchange for
statements against him.
McBride had previously clashed with the
OCU.
About a month before his colleagues
changed their statements, he had written to the SA Police Service asking them
to initiate an investigation into the possible involvement of some members of
the OCU in cash-in-transit crimes.
In Thursday's judgment, Pretorius and
Molopa-Sethosa wrote there was clear evidence that OCU members had manipulated
the testimony of the three.
Describing the three as “self-confessed
liars”, the judges said the magistrate had erred in finding their testimony
credible.
There were “several strange aspects” to
McBride's behaviour after the accident, such as trying to get medical
certificates from a variety of doctors and driving to Durban to see a doctor.
The State had not proved its case
beyond a reasonable doubt, the judges concluded.
“Although the appellant's action after
the accident is suspect, it is not possible to draw the inference that the
appellant was driving under the influence of intoxicating alcohol at the time
beyond a reasonable doubt.” - Sapa
