DJ@SG_Walther Music Charts 31 October 2014 #Top40 #Music

Dj@ SG Walther                 Also see UK top 40 link  at the end of the chart
* Cape Town *	Songs ranked firstly into Chart Playlist & then
Top 125	alphabetically by Artist within each playlist.
31 October 2014
TOP-10		Rating
Caution To the Wind	Becky Hill	100
Break the Rules	Charli XCX	100
Ghost (Switch Remix Radio Edit)	Ella Henderson	100
Imagination (feat. Katy Menditta)	Gorgon City	100
Time	Jungle	100
Crumbler	Jungle	100
Way We Are Extended Mix	Kove / Melissa Steel	100
It Was Always You	Maroon 5	100
Wicked Games (feat. Anna Naklab)	Parra for Cuva	100
Cold (feat. Fryars)	Rae Morris	100
Prayer in C (Robin Schulz Remix)	Robin Schulz & LILLYWOOD	100
No Good in Goodbye	The Script	100
Flares	The Script	100
Runaway	sElf	100
Faded	ZHU	100
TOP-25
The Rain	Biffy Clyro	100
Higher Ground (feat. Charli Taft)	Blonde	100
If U Got It (Radio Edit)	Chris Malinchak	100
Always In My Head	Coldplay	100
Ink	Coldplay	100
Midnight	Coldplay	100
A Sky Full of Stars	Coldplay	100
Lift Off (feat. Pharrell)	Conor Maynard	100
Paper Trails	DARKSIDE	100
Okay	Holy Ghost!	100
Hideaway	Kiesza	100
Always (HK Miami 2014 Edit) [feat. Alana] [Route 94 Mix (Edit)]	MK	100
Waves (Robin Schulz Radio Edit)	Mr. Probz	100
Me and My Broken Heart	Rixton	100
TOP-40
Need You Right Now (ft. Mike Tompkins)	Bethany Mota	80
Treasure	Bruno Mars	80
Rather Be (feat. Jess Glynne)	Clean Bandit	100
Another's Arms	Coldplay	80
Cool Kids	Echosmith	100
One	Ed Sheeran	100
My Silver Lining	First Aid Kit	80
Pumped Up Kicks	Foster the People	60
Solo Dancing	Indiana	100
Busy Earnin'	Jungle	100
Son of a Gun	Jungle	80
Brand New Day Radio Mix	Kodaline	100
ARTPOP	Lady Gaga	80
Animals	Maroon 5	80
Teenage Dirtbag	Mighty Little	100
You’re Not Alone (feat. Britt Nicole)	Owl City	80
The Energy Never Dies	The Script	100
No Odda	Tafari	80
Glow In the Dark	The Wanted	100
Under the Pressure	The War on Drugs	80
Chocolate	The 1975	100
TOP-80
minipops 67 [120.2] [source field mix]	Aphex Twin	80
Reflektor	Arcade Fire	80
Things We Lost In the Fire	Bastille	100
Of The Night	Bastille	100
What I Might Do (Radio Edit)	Ben Pearce	100
So Good To Me Original Mix	Chris Malinchak	100
Dust Clears	Clean Bandit	100
True Love	Coldplay	80
Can't Say No	Conor Maynard	100
She Wolf (Falling to Pieces) [feat. Sia]	David Guetta	80
Latch (feat. Sam Smith)	Disclosure	100
Back to Love (feat. Jay Sean)	DJ Pauly D	100
Hold On, We're Going Home (feat. Majid Jordan)	Drake	100
Bloodstream	Ed Sheeran	80
Nature Trips	Eyedress	80
Invisible	FM Attack	100
Budapest	George Ezra	60
Here For You (feat. Laura Welsh)	Gorgon City	80
History (feat. Will Young)	Groove Armada	80
Permission To Love	Hayden James	80
Self Machine (Coconut Candy ‘No Need For Plastic Palm Trees’ Elly Jackson Remix)	I Blame Coco	100
Right Here	Jess Glynne	80
Tough Love	Jessie Ware	80
My Love	jj	100
Drops	Jungle	80
The Big Bang	Katy Tiz	80
Fall For You (feat. April) [Sandy Rivera's Classic Mix]	Kings of Tomorrow	100
Cool	Le Youth	80
Team	Lorde	60
Maps	Maroon 5	80
Love Never Felt So Good	Michael Jackson	80
Slave to the Rhythm	Michael Jackson	80
Us	Movement	80
Destination	Nickel Creek	80
Counting Stars	OneRepublic	100
Miss Jackson (feat. LOLO)	Panic! At the Disco	100
Trying to Be Cool	Phoenix	100
My Love	Route 94 / Jess Glynne	100
Paranoia, Ghosts & Other Sounds	Safia	80
Veil	Samantha James	80
Six Degrees Of Separation	The Script	80
Good Morning, Sunshine	Shortstraw	100
24 Hours	Sky Ferreira	80
Look Right Through	Storm Queen & MK	80
Every Breaking Wave	U2	80
This Is Where You Can Reach Me Now	U2	60
My Head Is a Jungle (Radio Edit)	Wankelmut & Emma Louise	100
Red Eyes	The War on Drugs	80
TOP_125
Leave Me Alone	Alexander Rybak	80
I’ll Show You	Alexander Rybak & Seling	100
This Is What It Feels Like ( Trevor Guthrie)	Armin van Buuren	80
One Day (Vandaag) [Radio Edit]	Bakermat	60
Pompeii	Bastille	80
Dangerous (feat. Joywave)	Big Data	80
Bottoms Up	Brantley Gilbert	60
Animal	Conor Maynard	100
Turn Around (feat. Ne-Yo)	Conor Maynard	80
I Got U (feat. Jax Jones)	Duke Dumont	100
Need U (100%) Original Mix	Duke Dumont ft. A*M*E	100
Kemosabe	Everything Everything	80
One More Day (Stay with Me)	Example	80
Call	Francesco Yates	60
Friend Crush	Friends	100
Go All Night (feat. Jennifer Hudson)	Gorgon City	80
Wings	HAERTS	60
Curse Curse	James	80
The Answer	Josh Kumra	100
All Bad	Justin Bieber	100
Flatline	Justin Bieber	60
Roller Coaster	Justin Bieber	80
Jubel	Klingande	80
Brokenhearted No Rap Version	Lawson	80
Let Your Hair Down	MAGIC!	60
Rude	MAGIC!	80
Sunlight (feat. Years and Years)	The Magician	80
Take Yours, I'll Take Mine	Matthew Mole	60
You and I (Deadmau5 Remix)	Medina	80
All About That Bass	Meghan Trainor	60
La La La	Naughty Boy / Sam Smith	100
Chains	Nick Jonas	80
Am I Wrong	Nico & Vinz	80
If I Lose Myself	OneRepublic	100
Back and Forth	Operator Please	80
Hoyle Road	Pedestrian	80
Happy (from "Despicable Me 2")	Pharrell Williams	80
Kingfisher	PHOX	60
Please Forgive Me	The Pierces	80
Chain My Name	POLIÇA	80
Boom Boom (Heartbeat)	Ray Foxx	60
Diamonds	Rihanna	80
Blurred Lines (feat. T.I. & Pharrell)	Robin Thicke	60
Money On My Mind	Sam Smith	80
Man on a Wire	The Script	80
Aviation High	Semi Precious Weapons	80
Ishq Da Rogh	SK-1	80
Don't You Worry Child	Swedish House Mafia	100
Trouble's Lament	Tori Amos	60
Reminder	Travis	80
The Troubles	U2	80
Wild Heart	The Vamps	80
Bullit	Watermät	60
It’s My Birthday (feat. Cody Wise)	will.i.am	60
The Fox (Extended Mix) http://siegfriedwalther.blogspot.com/2014/10/creating-radio-station-playlist-from.html   Everything you need to know about iTunes, volume levelling, and creating a "radio Station playlist of your own using Smart Playlists on iTunes. http://siegfriedwalther.blogspot.com/2014/11/uk-top-40-singles-chart-26-oct-2014.html              The Link for the Official UK Top 40 Singles & then on to the Album charts from there	Ylvis 80

Does #Oscartrial show #SouthAfrica must opt for #trial by #jury?

Jury Trial vs Trial by Judge. Does the +Oscartrial show that South Africa should opt for a jury system. I say no.

 

I note my concerns about Juries. And....

 

In fact, I end with some suggestions to improve the US & UK jury systems. 

 

1.     Unhappiness amongst some members of the South African public in regard to the outcome of one or two recent high profile criminal cases have resulted in several calls for the introduction of a jury system in this country.

 

2.     I write this article in defence of the South African criminal Justice system, and to point out that there are serious shortcomings with the Jury system.

 

3.      Frankly, it is folly to hope that perceived injustice will be removed by the introduction of twelve possibly biased jurors who have no knowledge of the law and whose decision about the guilt or otherwise of an accused will be based upon their gut feel.

 

4.     The recent Oscar Pistorius trial demonstrates how easily the public can supplant their own views for the actual facts of the case. What one then has is mob justice, and not a proper trial.  It is estimated by some experts specialising in interpreting trends on social media that around half, if not more of the South Africans using social media believe that +Oscar Pistorius ought to have been found guilty of intentionally murdering Ms Steenkamp.

 

5.     The fact of the matter is, on the evidence led at the trial, the Court could never have convicted Oscar Pistorius of intentional murder.  In this regard I not only refer to the judgment of the Honourable Trial Court in that trial, but I also refer to the published verdict delivered on 16 August 2014, prior to the Court’s judgment by me (published worldwide at several eBook stores under the pen-name of Judge Knott) who arrived at the same conclusion as did the Honourable Trial Judge. In arriving at my verdict, some of the  reasoning differs slightly from that of the actual judgment which came out afterwards. 


The full updated version of the verdict follows below. Probably not necessary to read it after reading this article since there is considerable overlap.

 

6.     The actual judgment and the verdict of Judge Knott are both capable of being criticised for possibly having made the same error of law. The State have in fact appealed against the verdict of the Court averring that, on Pistorius’ own version, he ought to have been convicted of murder dolus eventualis. I don’t propose to comment upon whether or not there is merit in the appeal, since it is now sub judice.

 

7.     The point is that our legal system permits the State to address any complaint it has about any misapplication of the law by a trial Court by launching an appeal. And it permits an accused to appeal on the grounds of the facts and the law.

 

8.     It seems that many people formed the view that +Pistorius was guilty after listening to his admittedly poor performance under cross examination.

 

9.     The accused’s evidence was found not to be honest throughout. This, most concluded, was more than sufficient evidence of his guilt.

 

10. And this is the first reason why jury trials are problematic.

 

11. The trial Court instead relied upon well-established case law which provides that just because a witness may have lied about some aspects of the case, this does not necessarily mean that their evidence as a whole falls to be rejected. The nature of the lies, the reasons why such lies may have been told, and the extent to which the remainder of that witnesses’ evidence has been shown to be true by other forensic evidence or is supported by other witnesses’ evidence are all factors to be considered prior to outright rejection of a witness who has told a lie.

 

12.  The process of weighing up a witnesses’ evidence as a whole against that part found to be untrue requires a dispassionate examination of such witness’s evidence and the consideration of all that witness’s evidence against the remainder of the accepted evidence led at the trial. This is an exercise in which the public at large seems to have dismally failed.

 

13.  In particular, many have focused on Oscar’s poor performance as a witness without contemplating the serious problems which plagued the State’s version.

 

14.  Before I elaborate on these problems, let me ask a question.

 

15.  Let us assume we have a State case which has inherent contradictions and which is arguably improbable, and we also have an accused who is lying through his teeth. Should the Court convict that accused?

 

16.  A jury would be inclined to convict, whereas, a judge would examine the state’s case first. A judge would be loath to convict an accused who has lied in circumstances where the case presented by the State is itself shaky.

 

17.  Allow me to demonstrate. The first major problem the State suffered from in the Pistorius case is that it failed, in my view, to select a single coherent version to present as the State case, and which could then be put to the Accused during cross examination. This fact went unnoticed by almost everyone, including many expert commentators.

 

18.  The State knew that it had no eyewitness to the event in question. It was thus incumbent upon the State to evaluate the forensic and other evidence very carefully to decide whether it had sufficient evidence to prove its theory that the Accused deliberately killed the Deceased following an alleged argument.

 

19.  My submission is that there was insufficient evidence available to the State to prove its theory of intentional murder following an argument.

 

20.  Despite this, the State proceeded with its case of intentional murder, and the Accused was cross-examined on this version. At the same time, however, the State, mindful of the alternate charges of Murder dolus eventualis, and culpable homicide, the State at times cross-examined the Accused by trying to use the Accused’s version against him.

 

21.  One can have alternative charges which one can put to an accused, but before the State closes its case, which is well before cross examination of the Accused occurs, the State ought to select its strongest case and that is the case it must put to the Accused in cross-examination.

 

22. The State’s version, involving a deliberate intention to murder the Deceased, and the Accused’s version, that he genuinely believed he was shooting an intruder, are mutually incompatible. You can’t put it to an accused that he intended to kill the Deceased, and then later put it to him that he was negligent or reckless when he shot at what he thought was an intruder. The cross examination for each of those incompatible charges requires that the State attempt to solicit or to ‘entrap’ the accused into giving entirely different answers.

 

23.  In addition, the State had numerous other problems in regard to using the contaminated crime scene to support its varying versions. The accused’s less than coherent response under cross-examination becomes far more understandable if one considers the varying versions of the State’s case with which he was confronted.

 

24.  The absence of the initial investigating officer as a witness for the prosecution is also a weird feature of this case. It prevented the Accused’s legal team from confronting him with a variety of assumptions made on his part which are likely to have given rise to the State’s belief that the accused was indeed guilty of murder. Bear in mind that intentional murder was the State’s version within hours of the shooting itself.

 

25.  This brings me to the biggest problem of all in regard to the State’s theory that Pistorius was guilty of intentionally murdering the deceased.

 

26.  Most fatal incidents of domestic violence committed by men against women usually occur when the men involved are under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

 

27.  In stark contrast, logic and human experience suggests that the odds that the average man, who is entirely sober, and who is involved in a heated argument with his girlfriend, would decide that it is a good idea to teach his girlfriend (who has locked herself in the toilet) a lesson by walking off to fetch his fire-arm, and then to return to fire at her through the door of the toilet, knowing that this would probably kill her, must be extremely remote.

 

28. Surely, no matter how angry the man may be, at some point while going to fetch the gun or while walking back down the passage towards the toilet with that gun, he would realise that if he proceeded to shoot her, he would in fact not be teaching her any lesson at all. Instead, he would surely realise that if he did indeed fire his gun at the toilet door, he would end up being the bigger loser.

 

29.  What I found frightening was that virtually nobody seemed to view the State’s case that a sober accused shot the deceased after an argument to be inherently improbable, even fanciful.

 

30. No matter how angry the Accused may have been, and no matter how much he may have wanted to rid himself of her, it beggars belief that he, whilst fully sober, would resort to shooting her to achieve this result. At some point, prior to actually firing, he must have realised that this would end badly for him, and in particular, it might destroy his life and his career. It is far more probable that the Accused would have stopped and instead shouted at her to get out of the toilet, and to get out of his home and his life, if that is what he wanted to achieve.

 

31.   Following on from the last point, one should bear in mind too, that there is another factor which is often present in incidents of domestic violence which is not present here. The protagonists in most domestic violence incidents are usually married or they live together. Domestic violence between two people in a relatively new relationship is much rarer.

 

32. Thus, none of the usual financial motives as to why spouses or cohabitees might want to kill each other were present in this case. (eg. To benefit from an Insurance policy: to avoid a messy or costly divorce; to be assured of gaining custody of a child; to avoid having to divide jointly owned assets etc etc) The absence of any such consideration in this case also assists to make the State’s case less probable.

 

33. All things being equal, the State’s case does not make sense and falls to be rejected as improbable. The overwhelming majority of sober men, no matter how angry, would simply not respond to an argument with a new girlfriend by using deadly force, while knowing that the result would be that their own lives and careers would be ruined in the process.

 

34.  There is a reason why the investigating officer was not called as a State witness. And it is not just because of his poor performance as a witness at the bail hearing. The real reason is more likely that, under cross-examination, he might be forced to concede that in his past experience, most if not all the violent deaths of a woman at the hands of her lover which he has investigated, involved the use by the perpetrator of alcohol or drugs.

 

35. Quite possibly, considering that the call to the police was made during the early hours of the morning, the investigating officer would probably have arrived at the scene expecting that, having regard to the time of the offence, alcohol or drugs were likely to have played a role.

 

36.  Since the investigating officer was not called as a witness, we don’t know whether at the crime scene, the Accused possibly denied having partaken of drugs or alcohol, and perhaps he said that his training regime did not lend itself to using alcohol to excess or to the use of any drugs at all.

 

37.  It is not uncommon for an investigating officer in a criminal case to form an early theory of the case and then to doggedly cling on to that theory despite growing evidence drawing that theory into question. His theory is often adopted by the State, and sometimes a joint tunnel vision takes hold. Many an innocent person has been convicted of a crime in circumstances where a theory of the crime becomes embedded in the minds of the police and the State to a point where other likely suspects, including the real criminal, are not properly investigated, or in other cases, are not investigated at all.

 

38.  Perhaps everyone forgot that in this case, the investigating officer apparently announced that the police had found a few vials of what they believed were steroids next to the accused’s bed. It was only later that the police were forced to concede that the products in question were supplements which were quite legal for athletes to use.

 

39. Why would an investigating officer even release an unsubstantiated statement suggesting that an athlete is using steriods knowing that the use of such substances carries a lifetime ban for any athlete concerned?

 

40.  The answer is simple. The investigating officer could well have been trying to fit pieces of a puzzle into a theory developed at the outset of the investigation. If the accused’s totally unreasonable anger and conduct could not be attributed to alcohol or drugs, then surely steroids were to blame. Rage is a known side-effect of steroid use.

 

41.  The problem for the State, however, is that sometime later, the Accused’s toxicology did not reveal the presence of any drugs, alcohol or steroids at the time of the incident. This immediately caused the rug to be pulled from under the state’s theory. It must have occurred to the police that the State’s theory that a sober accused would react to an argument by deciding to shoot and kill the deceased would sound preposterous or far-fetched to most fair minded people.

 

42. Unless….. Unless the State could show that the accused had a personality disorder or severe character defect which included a propensity to become enraged or violent.  Such evidence would surely overcome the improbabilities in the State’s version.

 

43.  To that end, the state no doubt set about trying to find anything from the Accused’s past which would serve to prove the existence of the said character defect or personality disorder.

 

44.  Hence the addition of the further charges.

 

45.  For the record, I make no comment as to whether the State’s (the Police, the prosecutors or the NPA) motives in acting as they did were out of the genuine belief that there was merit in their case or whether they were indeed hell bent on saving face and were simply hoping for the best. This article is aimed only at showing that the Judgment of the Honourable Masipa J to the effect that there was insufficient evidence to find the accused guilty of murder was correct, and that the criticism of her Ladyship’s judgment for failing to convict the accused of intentional murder is unfounded.

 

46.  The evidence led by the State admittedly painted a less than flattering picture of the Accused. And the Accused’s own performance in the witness box did little to undo the State’s efforts at character assassination. The Accused came across as a trigger happy, macho, arrogant, self-centred, ambitious, egotistical and single-minded rogue, for want of a better description.

 

47.  At the end of the day, however, all the evidence led fell way short of proving that the Accused had the requisite personality disorder involving a rage type of personality. It was not proved that he was prone to violence in general, still less that he was prone to violence against women.

 

48. You will no doubt recall that at one point during the trial, the Accused was examined by a State Psychiatrist, in addition to other psychiatric experts. None of them led any expert evidence of any rage type personality or personality defect which would cause him to respond to an argument with a rage sufficient to exclude logic and common sense.

 

49.  This is the problem most lay people refused to come to terms with.

 

50. They concluded that Oscar was lying, therefore, he had something to hide.

 

51.  They concluded that the evidence led at the trial was sufficient to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that he was subject to such fits of rage and prone to such violence that he would not be able to have prevented himself from using lethal violence in response to an argument when most sober men in his position, no matter how enraged, would never have resorted to lethal violence.

 

52. Perhaps the public were influenced by stories or facts regarding the Accused’s personality which were not led at the trial, and perhaps they later forgot which facts were led as evidence, and which facts originated from social media or from newspapers.

 

53.  This is the problem with a jury trial. It seems that, in long trials, with a lot of conflicting evidence, people are prone to forming a view of the case early on in the trial. From then on, it is likely that they subconsciously exclude the evidence which runs counter to their view and perhaps they over-emphasise the evidence which tends to support their view.

 

54.  The State happily put both its inconsistent versions to the accused whilst at the same time it lambasted the accused for having more than one version himself. The accused suggested on the one hand, that his reaction to the perceived threat was deliberate, whilst later suggesting that he fired the shots in an automatic reaction to the threat rather than deliberately.

 

55. Whilst the Court correctly rejected the Accused later version, this later version is not nearly as diametrically opposed to his earlier version as the two State versions were inconsistent with each other.

 

56. If the State’s version of intentional murder is to be rejected, as indeed it must on the evidence led, then one is left with a trigger happy scoundrel who rushed to the toilet partly out of fear, and partly with the intention of using his firearm in some misguided, ill-thought out attempt to shoot to kill in the hope of perhaps emerging as some form of crime fighting hero.

 

57.  Whatever occurred, it would not be wrong to assume, on the accused’s version, that he was confronted with a noise almost as soon as he entered the bathroom. If so, he probably fired at the perceived danger without any delay. Afterwards, when trying to piece together what happened and to make sense of the ensuing nightmare, the temptation to suggest that the events occurred so quickly that his reaction was more automatic than controlled, is possibly understandable, yet at the same time it was opportunistic and ill-conceived.

 

58. His reaction to the noise is so clearly excessive that it lends itself to the notion that his reaction could have had some element of automation to it. At least, the margin between automatic response and the actual shooting is arguably less than a second or so. The criticism of the fact that he tried to traverse that margin is understandable.

 

59. However, just as one of the State’s versions fell to be rejected, for lack of evidence, this later version of the Accused also fell to be rejected as being false because it was at odds with his statement the bail hearing, his written Section 115 Plea explanation filed at the commencement of the trial, and with other parts of his evidence where he stated that as he walked towards the bathroom, he was ready to shoot, or something to that effect.

 

60.  The rejection of his attempt to say that his reaction was automatic as being false does not mean that his whole version is false. In fact, if the State’s case falls to be rejected as being improbable, the only version one is left with is the remainder of the Accused’s version i.e. the version he advanced at the scene, the bail hearing and at the commencement of the trial. It is difficult to suggest that the Accused’s version cannot reasonably possibly be true considering that the State’s version falls to be rejected as improbable.

 

61.  Most of the accused’s version cannot be assailed by any other evidence. In contrast, as the Court points out, the Accused’s version is supported by objective evidence or other evidence in a number of respects.

 

62.  I refer to the Judgement of the High Court and that of Judge Knott in regard to the host of other problems in regard to the State’s case.

 

63.  I also refer everyone to both the real verdict and that of Judge Knott in regard to the time-line which tends to show that the screams heard are unlikely to have been that of the Deceased. If that is so, then it seems all the more so that the State may have been selective as to which witnesses they called. The Defence alleges that only those ear-witnesses whose evidence did not destroy their theory were called by the State.

 

64.  The point I am trying to illustrate in regard to the Pistorius case, is that the process of dealing with contradictory evidence, and the technique of spotting theories which seem plausible at face value to the public, but which are inherently improbable, is one which requires an above-average and preferably experienced mind to decipher and to judge.

 

65. Juries are prone to bias, to suggestion, to fatigue in long cases, to allowing their prejudices to govern their reason, to misunderstanding or misinterpreting the evidence and to misapplying the beyond a reasonable doubt test.

 

66. The result of a jury’s attempt at justice is often a conviction or an acquittal which bears little relation to the evidence actually led at the trial. In the Pistorius case, a jury may well have convicted the accused of premeditated murder, despite that the State’s case in that regard was based on conjecture and that it’s theory in that regard ought rightly to have been rejected as fanciful or highly improbable.

 

67. There is another major criticism one can level against juries which is seldom mentioned. South African criminal courts are required to deliver a written, reasoned verdict which deals with all the evidence led at the trial, which evaluates and weighs such evidence in order to come to the ultimate conclusion that the State has succeeded or failed, to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. Such a verdict must also include all the relevant legal principles.

 

68.  In sharp, and in my view, shocking contrast, juries are not burdened with any duty to provide any explanation at all to the accused for their verdicts. All the Accused in jury trials receives is a “We, the Jury, find the Accused guilty…or We, the Jury, find the accused Not Guilty.”

 

69.  If the accused in a jury trial is acquitted, I doubt that he will ever die wondering about precisely why he was acquitted. However, the victims of the crime or their families, would certainly want to be told why the jury acquitted the accused. The prosecutors would also no doubt benefit from learning why they lost. All these people have the right, in my view, to know why the Jury ruled as it did.

 

70.   Instead, it seems that an Accused who is convicted at a jury trial is simply left to speculate as to the alleged error in law or error of fact which the Jury might have made And the absence of a verdict which demonstrates a leap of logic, bias, a misapplication of the law or the reliance on inadmissible evidence etc. makes it more difficult to persuade the Appellate Court that the Jury did get it wrong. Little wonder appellants from jury trials seem to have so little success in the US Court system.

 

71.       That is the real strength of the South African Criminal Justice system. In my view, any person who is convicted of any charge, or even an accused who is acquitted, is entitled to a reasoned judgment showing precisely which witnesses’ versions, were accepted, which witnesses’ versions, were rejected, which facts were found to be proved and why certain facts or evidence adduced at the trial was rejected or found to be inconclusive, and finally which explains how the Court arrived at its decision, and this ought to include references to each legal principle relied upon.

 

72.       The fact that a Judge presiding over a South African criminal case is obliged to render a detailed judgment has several crucial benefits.

 

73.       Firstly, the Court has to pay attention to all the evidence. A verdict which fails to deal with any crucial evidence led, with a view to slotting it in its proper context, is likely to give rise to an appeal.

 

74.       Secondly, the obligation to deliver a reasoned judgment also discourages the Court from delivering a biased judgment or one which relies on inadmissible evidence. If the judgment is biased or it relies upon inadmissible evidence, this will be obvious if the Court includes such biased or such inadmissible evidence in its reasoning.

 

75.       But even if the Court relies upon inadmissible evidence or bias to arrive at its verdict, and the Judge were to decide to exclude any reference to that evidence in an endeavour to hide his reliance on that evidence, the rest of the judgment will nonetheless have to conclusively establish that the accused is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. A judgment based upon undisclosed biased reasoning or upon inadmissible evidence which is not disclosed will inevitably suffer from gaps, or leaps of logic which will render it appealable on the grounds that the remaining evidence adduced before and considered by the Court is insufficient to establish the accused’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

 

76.       Single Judges in the South African system are aware of the Accused’s right to appeal. Judges do not like to have their judgments corrected on appeal. Thus they usually tend to take their duty to deliver a sound, reasoned judgment seriously, and therein lies an added layer of protection for the accused.

 

77.       And as set out above, if an Accused is convicted, his legal team will be able to peruse and consider the written judgement to establish whether it is appealable or not. Errors made by the Court of first instance can be glaringly obvious from the judgment itself and any wrongful conviction in such a case can be easily overturned on appeal.

 

78.       The fact that juries are not required to answer to the people they convict in the same manner is as astounding as it is shockingly unjust.  It leaves a convicted accused in the unenviable position of not being able to show the Appeal Court precisely how and why the Jury got it wrong.

79.       It is often said that juries are comprised of those who are not wise enough to avoid jury duty. In any case, the thought of being judged by anyone who resents being there in the first place is frightening in itself.

 

80.       Apart from not understanding the law, the rules of evidence and the like, Juries are often lost in complicated technical matters or in long trials.

 

81.       Juries often struggle with multiple accused.

 

82.       Juries are selected from those who allegedly have not gone on to the internet to read up about the case. Those who lie about what they have read to get onto a jury are apparently often joined in time by most of the remaining jurors who eventually succumb to their curiosity. The problem is that they then sometimes struggle to keep that which they have read apart from that which they have learned at the trial.  Here again, a verdict would help to expose the reliance by a jury on inadmissible evidence. But juries don’t have to account to anyone.

 

83.       At the very least, the system could be changed to permit a Judge to deliberate and vote with the jury. In addition, the Judge ought then to retire to deliver a reasoned Judgment indicating why he, together with the Jury, decided to convict or acquit.

 

84.       This, I believe, would address most of my concerns about juries whilst maintaining a system where one is tried by a jury of one’s peers. Most often the Jury will follow the Judge’s advice. However, if they disagree with him, they can outvote him and their superior numbers ought to prevent them from feeling unable to challenge him.

 

85.       As to the rules relating to divided juries, over which a Judge presides, new rules as to what numbers constitute a verdict (which include the Judge’s vote) will have to be fashioned. Simple majority? Two thirds? I leave it to you. Judge’s vote could count for two possibly?

 

86.       Whatever the voting process the proposed change would require, one thing must be non-negotiable. If the Judge is convinced that the Jury’s conviction amounts to a miscarriage of justice, he must have the power to acquit or to declare a mistrial.


87. From what I have been able to ascertain, the fact that jury trials are the norm in the United States is part of the reason why the proportion of convicted prisoners from the minority communities in the US is so much higher than that of white Americans.  The other, I am lead to understand, is that the US state prosecutors often pressurise the poorer accused to accept plea bargains involving lesser sentences instead of facing the likelihood of conviction at the Jury trial, where the odds seem to be stacked against minority accused, or so many minority accused believe or are lead to believe.


In deeply divided societies,  the possibility of prejudice, particularly racial prejudice arising from conscious or unconscious stereotyping only serves to add a further complication to what I submit is an already flawed system of criminal justice.






http://siegfriedwalther.blogspot.com/2014/10/oscartrial-oscarpistorius-verdict-by.html


**  I mention in passing that I have received many messages from fans of Oscar Pistorius thanking me for the views I expressed in my judgement. They seem awfully pleased that my conclusion and that of the Honourable Judge is the same and that the reasoning is much the same.

**A small minority of his fans however, have taken exception to some of the observations or comments I made in regard Oscar's character and in regard to his performance on the witness stand. I don't mind this at all. I understand that feelings and loyalties on both sides of the divide run high.


**If I dare to weigh in with my views, I have to be prepared "to cop some flak" and I understand and accept this.




** May I simply re-state what I said in the foreword of the Verdict, however. I did not undertake the exercise with a view to support Oscar Pistorius or any of his detractors. In regard to the accused, I called it, as I saw it. I bear none of the parties to what I believe is a tragedy any malice whatsoever,


**Since this was an exercise with an end in mind and not a real judgment, if I am guilty of anything, I perhaps rushed a little, and perhaps I may have expressed some views about the accused and perhaps also the State a little less elegantly than I would have done if I carried the burden of being the actual Honourable Judge. If I ever run into anyone involved one day, and if anyone complains about the tone of anything I wrote, I will tender any apologies which may be due...


**Instead, my intention was to attempt to defend a legal system, which, although not perfect, is one I believe in. And to this end I simply called the facts as I saw it. (I accept that some fans will say I was to harsh about OP and some detractors will condemn my views in the same way the Court's verdict was condemned.


**That too is fine. Court's judgements may be criticised, although this should be done respectfully. My opinion can be condemned, with or without respect.


**At the end of the day, however, two things remain. My verdict and that of the Honourable Trial Judge is roughly the same although some reasons differ. To that end, I believe I have demonstrated that our Criminal Justice system works and that it is not arbitrary.   (Of course, both "judgments may yet be shown on appeal to contain the same error in regard to dolus eventualis etc. )


**Secondly, and even if both verdicts are found to be wrong in part, I hope that the fact that anyone who is interested in learning about our legal system will at least be able to compare the two judgments and perhaps learn something about our system of criminal justice. Instead of being chaotic, it follows a certain and predictable order! I find beauty, and comfort in that!!

 

Siegfried Walther

 

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