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- A special court is being built at Goodwood Prison in Cape Town to accommodate the large group due to go on trial with Nafiz Modack.
- It will have consulting rooms for lawyers and single cells.
- This is expected to assist with the logistical nightmare of bringing the accused from six prisons, but is controversial.
A special court is being built at Goodwood Prison in Cape Town specifically for the murder and racketeering trial of Nafiz Modack and 14 others.
Prosecutor Greg Wolmarans said at their pretrial in the Western Cape High Court on Friday that this would help with the logistical problems associated with the trial.
This highly controversial strategy is already in operation at Pollsmoor Prison regarding the trials of the Laughing Boys from Hanover Park and the Terrible Josters from Delft.
The Josters' case was held at the Western Cape High Court, but it was recently moved to the tiny cage-like court at Pollsmoor Prison in Tokai.
The Laughing Boys trial was also held there, despite objections by lawyers who felt that having a trial on prison premises created the perception that the accused were already guilty.
Prison courts also place extra restrictions on the public and media who might want to observe proceedings. Cellphones for example are not allowed into the prison's premises, even for the media, and at Pollsmoor, the media must watch proceedings on a TV in the waiting area.
It is understood that besides the logistics, authorities also want to avoid potential fights between different groups of accused in gang cases as they mingle in holding cells in the High Court before being taken upstairs.
The Modack case involves accused alleged to belong to the Terrible Westsiders and the Junky Funky Kids.
The State said an existing facility on the prison grounds at Goodwood was being converted into the court.
It will also have lawyers' consulting rooms and single jail cells. It was not clear whether the single cells were for the purposes of a sleepover at Goodwood Prison, instead of going to their usual prison at the end of each day.
It is expected to be ready by October.
Courts already use an audio-visual remand system in some cases, where quick postponements are done in an office in some prisons which have strong enough fibre connections to court. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Teams or Zoom was also used in some cases.
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The case the court will host involves the murders of Anti-Gang Unit detective Charl Kinnear, the father of a former Hawks officer, a tow truck driver and a night club bouncer, as well as the attempted murder of lawyer William Booth and a security company owner.
With the accused coming from six different prisons for each court appearance, it is hoped that this approach will cut down on the logistics, which includes high speed security convoys through the city.
The court roll is also clogged, with Judge Nathan Erasmus saying on Friday that at the most recent court managers' meeting, he was told there was a backlog of more than 100 criminal matters waiting for a court to be allocated.
The next Modack pretrial will be on 9 June, still in the Western Cape High Court.
