Macia killing: cops await judgment

Several outside broadcast vans were station near the court entrance along Madiba Street.

As Bam summarised the evidence of the pathologist who conducted the post mortem on Macia, a woman in the public gallery bowed her head and cried quietly, sniffing back her tears.

As eight former police officers accused of killing Mido Macia prepare to hear their fate in the High Court in Pretoria this morning, the Mozambican taxi driver’s family say they remain positive the judge will rule in their favour. Matome Ramatlou walked out of the court a free man after Judge Bert Bam told him that there was no evidence linking him to the murder.

The convicted police officers are Bongamusa Mdluli‚ Meshack Malele‚ Thamsanqa Ngema‚ Percy Mnisi‚ Sipho Ngobeni‚ Lungisa Gwababa‚ Bongani Kolisi and Linda Sololo. The accused were all dismissed from the SA Police Service following a disciplinary hearing.

The video showed Mr Macia struggling with police on 26 February 2013 after apparently parking his vehicle illegally in Daveyton, east of the city of Johannesburg.

He died hours later in police custody.

The video showed Mr Macia, from Mozambique, struggling with police on 26 February after parking his vehicle illegally and causing a traffic jam in Daveyton, east of Johannesburg.

They said Mr Macia had fallen out of the van and the handcuffs “accidentally hooked on to the back on the van”.

But defence attorneys van Wyngaardt and Benny Ndaba say the state has not been able to prove its case and the accused should be allowed to go home. The incident made global headlines and sparked several protests against police brutality.