One Tragic Night (57 page)

The former police expert took a swipe at the conduct of the SAPS officials on the way they handled the scene, describing it as most unprofessional:

This type of criticism was being echoed in the streets outside the court. It wouldn't be the first case bungled by police incompetence or negligence, and
if the police behaved in this manner at one of the most high-profile cases in the world, what was the average person experiencing at everyday crime scenes across the country? However, in this extraordinarily high-profile case, the police had made use of their very best forensic experts and those with the most experience.

Speaking to members of the prosecution team as well as police investigators, it was clear that Nel was going to give Dixon a lambasting when it came to cross-examination. The prosecutor was itching to tear a strip off the former policeman. It all came down to the role of an expert witness in a trial and the scope to which that person can competently testify. The qualified geologist was employed at the University of Pretoria's Department of Geology where he was responsible for analysing ‘soils and all sorts of things', but he wasn't affiliated to any forensic body and did not conduct regular proficiency tests in his fields of expertise, like the police do. Yet he felt competent enough to provide expert evidence on forensics.

‘You understand what the difference is between a normal general witness and a expert witness?' asked Nel in his opening line of enquiry.

‘The difference is that the layman has not got specific knowledge in the area in which they are doing their examination,' explained Dixon. ‘And an expert would be somebody who has got experience in applying their training to the matter at hand.'

The prosecutor questioned whether, as an expert witness, he would have to explain to the court the processes undertaken to reach the final conclusion. Dixon started his answer by listing the items he had studied, and then pointed out that while he is not a ballistics expert he did apply logic to reach his conclusions, before using an analogy of a geological map that plotted out bedrock to infer that similar principles applied to crime scene investigation.

It was tedious. Nel was swinging his spectacles in his right hand, put his leg up on his chair and at times talked to his colleague Andrea Johnson as the witness rambled on. This was to be a hallmark of Dixon's testimony.

Nel cut to the chase. ‘You gave evidence on sound,' he asked, referring to the tests of the bat being struck against the door compared to gunshots. ‘Are you a sound expert? Just answer that question.'

‘I would hope that my evidence that I present is sound, yes,' said Dixon, being facetious.

While Bennie van Staden, the official photographer, sitting amongst the state's experts behind the prosecutor, could barely contain his laughter, the answer annoyed the prosecutor. ‘Are you a sound expert, sir?'

‘No.'

Nel continued to clarify his question to avoid further games from the witness:

The tests were done at the shooting range where guests are required to wear ear protection when discharging firearms. But Dixon didn't wear protection when he struck the door with the bat. ‘I know what the sound of a gunshot at close range is. It is a very loud crack and it can damage the ears. A cricket bat hitting an object does not generate that very loud crack at close range.'

Dixon also conceded that he had not used the actual cricket bat used by Oscar when conducting the experiments.

Once the prosecuting team had had an opportunity to listen to the recording, Nel tackled Dixon on possible manipulation of the tests. ‘I listened to the sounds and on listening to it, I formed the idea that the bat sounds were amplified,' he said. The background noises of the crickets or frogs had been the giveaway. Nel was referring to the bat sound where the background noises were clearly audible, but this was not the case on the recordings of the gunshots. Did the defence team have the bat recordings amplified to sound as loud as the gunshots? Nel certainly believed so.

Dixon did not testify from a report, nor did the defence provide one to the state when the witness took the stand. Instead, Dixon said he compiled several reports on various subjects and tests that he submitted to counsel. When questioned on this, Roux offered to provide Nel with the various reports Dixon had compiled, but this was an afterthought and in response to questions. Several of these reports were later handed over to the state.

Nel wasn't satisfied that Dixon would simply come to court – and play the clips – and still not provide a report or any other information to support what had been
presented. ‘As far as a scientific expert is concerned, that is enough? The court does not know where you were. The court does not know what recording equipment was used. The court does not know how the door was set up.' Dixon had not divulged any of this, although Wolmarans presented the court with all these details in his report, which curiously was compiled after Dixon's testimony.

Unbeknown to the defence team, Nel had got wind that a second round of shooting tests had been conducted at the range. But Dixon did not state this in his evidence-in-chief, and he was forced to reveal to the court that he was not present when the second set of tests was conducted – although Wolmarans was, along with most of the other people at the first test. At the first test the brand-new firearm was jamming, so the shots in quick succession could not be recorded, only single shots.

‘So what was played to court did not happen on one day?' asked Nel, stunned by what he had just heard. ‘You identified the gun … but you were not present when it was done?' The prosecutor was now agitated:

Dixon confirmed that after the failed first test with the firearm he had suggested that the recordings could be digitally edited so that the single shots could be grouped to sound like they were firing in quick succession. It was Wolmarans who decided to conduct the test again, so as to present to the court an unedited sound clip. Of course, this raised questions over the integrity of the witness: why would he even consider submitting as evidence altered audio recordings? Dixon also confirmed that the two men recording the gunshots and bat strikes were not audio specialists, but sound engineers.

Nel was relentless and forced Dixon into what was arguably the most embarrassing and memorable concession of his testimony. The geologist admitted that ‘the instrument' he had used to test the visibility in Oscar's bedroom was ‘my eyes'. He attempted to explain that his intention was to see what was visible when
he was only using his eyes simply because this was the most relevant aspect to this case.

Nel insisted that this was subjective and Dixon conceded that the ability of a person to see would be subject to conditions such as the state of his or her eyes and whether or not the person was used to being in the dark. In fact, Dixon went as far as to concede that with the curtains open and a full moon in the sky, there was ‘quite a lot of light' in the athlete's bedroom. Dixon also didn't know that, according to the state's version, Oscar's balcony light was on and the curtains were open.

During his evidence-in-chief, Dixon had used photographs he had taken during his investigations, with a model posing on his knees in Oscar's bathroom. By this he had wanted to establish whether or not the Stipps would have been able to see Oscar through the window if he was wearing his prosthetic legs. Under cross-examination Nel established that the man in the photographs would have been 20 centimetres shorter than Oscar when he was on his stumps.

‘It is something I omitted,' Dixon acknowledged.

Dixon had also looked from the street outside the Stipps' house, rather than from their actual balcony when he was attempting to establish what the couple could have seen from their home on the morning of the shooting.

And yet, despite the barrage from Nel, Dixon remained confident. In fact, he was so self-assured that he challenged the ballistics evidence of Captain Mangena and the forensic evidence of pathologist Gert Saayman.

Dixon said that according to his calculations, none of the four bullets Oscar had fired had failed to hit Reeva. He also claimed he had managed to detect tiny splinters around Reeva's hip that Saayman had missed during the autopsy. Dixon had only attended three autopsies in his life, compared to the nearly 15 000 of Saayman, and Dixon had not been present at Reeva's.

Nel zeroed in on Dixon's earlier claim that the marks on Reeva's back had been caused by the magazine rack and not shrapnel. The geologist had suggested that the ‘kinetic energy' of being hit by a bullet in her hip would have caused Reeva to move backwards, like in movies the prosecutor suggested. But Nel challenged him to try to find any literature to support the theory that a bullet could move someone backwards. Dixon believed that by studying photographs he had identified a bruise on Reeva's back that Saayman had not picked up.

Nel argued that Saayman had extensively detailed the bruises in his report and, on the back foot, Dixon admitted that his ‘layman's impression' was different. He had been snared by Nel's trap as he acknowledged he was a layperson and not an expert in the field in which he was testifying.

During his testimony Dixon had also claimed that when carrying out the
ballistics tests, they were forced to use a different type of ammunition because the so-called Black Talon bullets that Oscar had apparently used were hard to come by. Oscar, however, had disagreed, saying on the stand that he used Black Talons simply because it was the type of ammunition required for his firearm.

In response to this, Sky News correspondent Alex Crawford tweeted: ‘Sky did a test with Black Talon bullets and we were supplied with them within a day.'

While on the stand Dixon told the court that he did not want his testimony to be affected by any external factors, so he had avoided following the trial. He claimed he had no television or radio at his home and he did not read newspapers. But it wasn't difficult for journalists to unearth his Twitter account. And it was clear from his account that he had been following the first few days of the state's case, retweeting posts of interest.

Also, on numerous occasions Nel had to repeat his questions because Dixon seemed to be avoiding answering. The prosecutor rephrased his questions to extract a simple yes or no answer, but still the response from the witness was long-winded and often unrelated. Their exchange even became heated, prompting the judge to step in:

Roux had made quite a deal about the need for microscopic analysis of exhibits in order to identify materials positively and match trace evidence collected from different items. The defence advocate had put it to the state witnesses that their own defence experts had conducted such tests, but now Nel challenged these tests.