South Africa: Massive Backlog At Sexual Offences Court Because of Broken Recording Machines

25 May 2022
GroundUp (Cape Town)
By Liezl Human

No accountability from courts or Minister of Justice's office

The Parow Sexual Offences Court has racked up a backlog of almost 200 outstanding cases since September last year due to constantly broken recording equipment. This court tries people for sexual offence crimes including rape and sexual assault.

The equipment initially broke in September 2021 and wasn't fixed for months. It was fixed and working again for a while in March but broke soon after. It has now been fixed again, according to a source at the court.

Court recording equipment is used for the recording and transcription of all court proceedings. Court proceedings can't continue without this machinery in working order and this means that for nearly six months no sexual offence trials went ahead or were finalised, causing the huge backlog.

All cases that were supposed to be heard in the court had to be postponed.

In March, activists protested outside the court about the delays caused by the broken machinery. According to Reverend June Dolley-Major, who handed over the activists' memo to the court, a few days after the protest the equipment was fixed and court proceedings could continue.

But according to a source at the court, the recording equipment broke again soon after. The source confirmed that the machinery is now working again but that the backlog is massive and "out of control". The backlog was normally just over 50 cases when the machines were working.

Sexual Offences courts were re-established by the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development (DOJ) in 2013 after the report of the Ministerial Advisory Task Team on the Adjudication of Sexual Offence Matters (MATTSO Report) was released. The report notes that the purpose of re-establishing these courts would be to deliver special services (in terms of personnel skills and infrastructure) to victims who are "particularly vulnerable and marginalised" including women, children, older people, LGBTI people and people with disabilities.

According to Justice Minister Ronald Lamola in December, only 19% of sexual offences cases were moving through the system. The rest - 15,605 cases or 81% - were backlogged. This was a massive increase from the 52% backlog in March 2021.

Asked for comment, the spokesperson for the Office of the Chief Justice referred GroundUp to the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice did not respond to us at all.

We also emailed several people in the Regional Court in Bellville, requesting comment. None responded.

Fikile Mbalula is going after us for R2 million. We must be doing something right. Support news that matters. Please donate to GroundUp.

Read the original article on GroundUp.

Tagged:
Copyright © 2022 GroundUp. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.

AllAfrica publishes around 400 reports a day from more than 100 news organizations and over 500 other institutions and individuals, representing a diversity of positions on every topic. We publish news and views ranging from vigorous opponents of governments to government publications and spokespersons. Publishers named above each report are responsible for their own content, which AllAfrica does not have the legal right to edit or correct.

Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica. To address comments or complaints, please Contact us.