Dewani May Take The Stand In A British Court

[Jean-Pierre]

Well at least we've now come full loop and are back to the Inquest, which is what this thread is about:  Dewani may have to take a witness stand.  This opportunity was not denied him in South Africa - he actively sought to avoids the witness stand first in fighting his extradition and then by his lawyer demanding a halt to his trial.  However the evidence sought by an inquest is different to that sought by a murder trial, and Dewani has had years to get his story straight, so I doubt it will prove anything either way.

Passer by. 
 
For your information,

(a) a lawyer cannot demand that a trial be ended.
(b) the judge quite properly stopped the trial because the prosecution had failed to make their case and their main witness was totally discredited
(c) there was therefore no need for Dewani to appear in the witness box - what would have been the point
(d) He cannot be forced to testify at an inquest, and the coroner cannot attribute guilt.

Perhaps you could put your views in a less excitable manner and without resorting to insulting other posters?

[Passer-by]

Passer by. 

For your information,

(a) a lawyer cannot demand that a trial be ended.
(b) the judge quite properly stopped the trial because the prosecution had failed to make their case and their main witness was totally discredited
(c) there was therefore no need for Dewani to appear in the witness box - what would have been the point
(d) He cannot be forced to testify at an inquest, and the coroner cannot attribute guilt.

Perhaps you could put your views in a less excitable manner and without resorting to insulting other posters?

Thank you Jean-Pierre:  all of those points apart from (a) I previously raised higher up this very thread.  I previously provided a link to an article in the Guardian citing that Dewani's lawyer had called in court for the trial to be halted, which covers (a).

My posts throughout this thread are factual.

[mercury]

Dewani surfed porn and gay dating sites for the same reason as many other people do. For comfort. For solace. For distraction. Or for any one of a myriad reasons. Whether some people wish to accept it or not people do deal with grief in vastly different ways ranging from near suicidal plunges into despair right through to an outer appearance of blank indifference and forcing oneself to "keep calm and carry on".

Dewani, by all accounts, showed a range of emotions and actions. Peolple like Passer-by and puglove focus on his internet searches yet that ignores the glaring evidence to suggest he was genuinely distraught at his wife's death.

Any law enforcement person will tell you that the one sure way to head down the wrong path in an investigation is to be led solely by the emotions of people involved. The person who cries loudest may be the perpetrator. The person who appears unmoved at the funeral may be the one who commits suicide ten days later, unable to cope with the grief.

If there was no other evidence in this case then I could understand people paying attention to Dewani's internet usage but considering the overwhelming evidence to show the "murder for hire" story was made up, focusing on this angle makes no sense at all.

You are joking aren't you? Have you ever heard of anyone else dealing with their grief by surfing and presumably "partaking" on a sex website for comfort and solace? Straight after  their new bride has been shot dead? Are you eating mushrooms perchance? Then again, you may be right and it is all part of the rich tapestry of life. "Scratches head" though.

PS No one is focussing on it, it's just another one of them..... things

[mercury]

On this point I agree with you. It is maddening when someone escapes justice simply because they refused to testify and tell what they know. I too have read about such cases and it jars the senses to think of people getting away with heinous crimes by manipulating the legal procedure in their own favour.

What you don't seem to be able to accept is that this does not even remotely describe what happened in the Dewani trial. Even if Shrien Dewani wanted to, he could not have given evidence. The trial was halted before he or his lawyer even had to make such a decision. Why was it halted? Because it was clear that the hitman story was fabricated and there was never any "murder for hire" agreement. No fair court in the world would have let such a trial continue.

I was referring to the inquest

[sika]

Hi DF, you make a very persuasive case.

However, there are a couple of things that still trouble me.  Dewani's failure to mention the 'helicopter money' and the link to Mrs Raghavjee and her murdered husband.

[dewanifacts]

Hi Sika,

I agree. Dewani's failure to mention the helicopter ride and the stolen R10000 is puzzling. That is the question I would most like to hear Dewani answer. There are indeed unknowns in this case, as with most crimes, however one should not be fooled into thinking that the existence of some unknowns means that everything else is unknown. There was ample evidence to prove that the hitman story was made up by the lying criminals to frame Dewani and obtain lenient sentences. That part is not in doubt to any thinking person who looks at the evidence.

What this means is that although there are aspects of Dewani's story that are puzzling and would be nice to have explanations for, those aspects are not relevant to the question of whether or not Dewani commissioned the murder of his wife, for we already know that "murder for hire" story to be made up.

The Raghavjee link is coincidental and not relevant to the case. Of course I understand why people at first thought it may be relevant considering the "murder for hire" story was all the rage in the UK tabloids and every news outlet in South Africa, but this was addressed by myself and a few other posters in the other thread and it really should not cloud anyone's judgement. Again - one only need look at the ample evidence that the hitman story was fictional to realise that actually there was no link at all between the Dewani and Raghavjee cases, other than the fact that they both involved an automobile based murder. The speculation and sensationalising of the potential link certainly sold a lot of newspapers though!

[sika]

Thanks DF.  I'm going back now to re-read the Raghavjee part of the thread.  If I recall correctly, it was your contention that one of the conspirators only made mention of Dewani arranging a similar murder, once learning of a possible link.

[dewanifacts]

It's on page 18 of the other thread - http://miscarriageofjustice.co/index.php?topic=6517.msg263812#msg263812

[sika]

Great. Thanks again.

[Passer-by]

I have never said it was strange for a traveller to change money.  On the contrary, I have repeatedly pointed out that the jewelry shop stands out as not normal precisely because Dewani got money out of a bank the normal way several times previously.

I have repeatedly posted from my personal experience of living across multiple countries and changing currency on a regular basis right where Dewani was actually staying - I provided members of this site with a map of where all the banks were in relation to Dewani's hotel and showed on it how he went out of his way to 'change money' somewhere else, and I showed a Streetview photograph of the large bank literally a couple of metres from the 'jewellers', and I have posted news reports stating Dewani's own lawyer's cross examination of the owner.  I have run around on all the manipulative little missions you've sent me off on, whilst you have done nothing but try to smear me.

Let's throw it out open wide:  how many other members of this website have gone on holiday and changed money at a seedy backstreet jewellers?  Can anyone help me out here?  Is this, as Dewanifacts says, 'normal'?  Or do you all exchange your money at a Bureau de Change or bank - especially if they're more readily available?

Lets be clear:  the transaction was illegal.  And let's be clear:  he did not tell the police investigating his wife's murder about it, so it was secret.

All the time Dewanifacts, you twist the truth. 

[John]

This thread has now been edited, posts relating to the illegal money exchange have been moved here.

Posters are reminded to remain within the topic theme and refrain from making personal comments.

[dewanifacts]

http://news.sky.com/story/1549469/murdered-anni-dewani-no-full-inquest

Looks unlikely that any inquest will be held. One can infer from the coroner's decision that he/she does not see any point to it because the evidence adduced in Dewani's criminal trial was more than enough to prove that he had nothing to do with it.

Unfortunately it looks like the Hindocha family are still receiving poor legal advice. They still seem to think that Shrien Dewani should be forced to publicly answer questions about his sexual behaviour. 

[Jean-Pierre]

He is under no obligation to say anything.

I am left wondering what they DO want him to say?  And what would satisfy them.

I have a feeling that nothing short of an admission of guilt by Shrien will give them closure. 

In the circumstances, they would perhaps be better advised to focus their fury on the murderers of their daughter.   

[dewanifacts]

Unfortunately the poor Hindochas are asking all the wrong questions of all the wrong people and they are questions that can never lead them to the truth. 

"Why did Shrien get out of the vehicle instead of staying with Anni?". He had a gun to his head.
"Why did Shrien marry Anni if he was gay?" He wanted to live a lie, like millions of other men who lead conflicted double lives.
"Why did Shrien take Anni to South Africa on honeymoon?" Same reason as many other honeymooners go to South Africa.
"Why did Shrien claim to be too ill to fly and now we've seen him in Kenya?" He was cleared of involvement in a murder. That would be a weight off any person's shoulders and help them to beat their mental illness.

They need to be directing their questions to the South African authorities. 

Mbolombo walks the streets a free man and he clearly knows a lot more than the lie infused story that he told in the Mngeni and Dewani trials.

Tongo will be out of jail in 4 years time.

Qwabe will be out in 14 years time.

An unknown fifth conspirator enjoys life as a free man.

Those are the miscarriages of justice.

[Eleanor]

He is under no obligation to say anything.

I am left wondering what they DO want him to say?  And what would satisfy them.

I have a feeling that nothing short of an admission of guilt by Shrien will give them closure. 

In the circumstances, they would perhaps be better advised to focus their fury on the murderers of their daughter.

They want him to admit that he was responsible for the death of their daughter when he might well not have been.  They will never accept anything else.