'Confused' judge steps down from trial

In what a Cape Times report describes as ‘a dramatic move seldom seen in court’, Judge André Louw has stepped down from presiding over Patrick Wisani’s murder trial in the Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg). On Monday last week, Louw made a comment about Wisani’s deceased girlfriend, Nosipho Mandleleni, which prosecutor Faghr Mohamed pointed out had been insensitive to her relatives. Wisani, who was the ANC Youth League chairperson for the Johannesburg inner-city branch, faces murder charges after allegedly sjambokking Mandleleni to death in September last year. The report claims that throughout the trial, Louw struggled to keep track of the facts, often confusing how different witnesses fitted into the picture, their names, as well as the sequence in and around locations where events took place. When Louw asked Wisani’s lawyer, Advocate Normal Makhubela, if he supported Mohamed’s application, the lawyer responded: ‘It would be foolhardy to disassociate myself entirely from this application.’ Louw then said: ‘Both counsel agreed that it would be in the interests of justice not to proceed before me. It is regrettable, but that is the view which both parties took and that is the important aspect of deciding on this application for recusal… I do not do this easily.’ The trial was provisionally set down for next month to be heard by a new judge from scratch.