The trial of Oscar Pistorius

Thankyou Pam Karp - Very topical in SA at the moment: so hopefully it will draw people into genealogy & Geni when it appears on Google searches.

But, it's also valuable as an SA Geni Project because it's the first internationally televised trial in South Africa - so, for us, it's like watching the Judge vs Jury system (that we're all used to seeing on TV) on trial.

And the judge Thokozile Matilda Masipa - only the second black woman admitted to the Bench in South Africa - is presiding over two talented white male advocates: Barry Roux & Gerrie Nel - from the oldest Afrikaner families.
It has been really impressive to watch all three do their jobs so efficiently in the face of an old history that had placed her on the other side of the Apartheid law (in a cell cleaning toilets for white male jailers for the mere act of participating in an anti-Apartheid protest); and a new history in which the police system is debilitated & discredited by rampant post-Apartheid corruption – widely evidenced to be the result of black male nepotism.

Then there are the issues raised by the fall from grace of an iconic symbol of struggle against adversity. Sport evokes such passion in SA that it is often said that it functions as another religion here; and Oscar Pistorius was an idol who had brought disability out from the shadows of victimhood and into the public imagination as sexy and empowering. So when, on Valentine’s Day, this symbol becomes an instrument of oppression himself, the paradox is almost too hard to bear.

But beyond the symbol is a young guy onto whom all these aspirations are hung, but without the resources of strong parent models: his parents divorce at 6; his mother dies at 15; his father is absent; his coaches seem to turn a blind eye to behaviour that is self-destructive and clearly indicative of anger management issues. Everything is about brand management and nothing is about helping a kid who can’t control his temper and has a paranoid fascination with guns.

And into this mix walks Reeva Steenkamp - the victim at ground zero.

Great break down Sharon!
I loved following the trial... and can't wait to hear Judge Masipa's ruling...

That is indeed a very worthwhile contribution to the discussion on the Oscar Pistorius trial. We still do not have any TV access to trials in the UK and hopefully this will be corrected in the near future. Public entry to trails is of course permitted to all over the age of 12 as is access to magistrates courts to al but family matters.
I still find it hard to accept the RSA system of trial by a judge sitting alone ( albeit with a couple of advisers to her side). I consider trial by a majority of 12 jurors more appropriate. The task of Judge Thokozile Matilda is indeed onerous.Masipa

Thanks, Don & Private User -
The televisation of the trial is an interesting question. While it appears to fulfil the democratic obligation that 'Justice must be done & also seen to be done,' it introduces the sensationalist ambience of a reality TV show, and a sense of trial by TV audience. This judge, once a crime reporter herself, has kept commendably tight control of what could easily make a spectacle of her court room (Oscar & other witnesses have been allowed to exercise a right not to be televised while testifying); but it could be argued that the spectacle itself is central to all formalised systems of justice anyway.

As to the trial by judge vs jury question – I have been brought up to think that the former is the more objective, and the latter makes of a trial a drama where the lawyers must play to a crowd. (And a crowd for whom intellectual qualifications or knowledge of the law are not a requirement). This seemed to me to be the logical conclusion that all rational people would reach – with the O. J. Simpson trial an excellent example of the pitfalls of a jury trial. However, I have found that other, very logical people – like the American Curator, Justin Durand- have been brought up to think exactly the opposite, so the question remains open for me.

In SA the jury system fell away during Apartheid, because of the extreme racial and class hatreds that could prejudice a jury, but I wonder how that is not the case overseas too.
I think we might be revisiting the question of a jury in SA in the future, as there is a move to acknowledge the indigenous systems of tribal law councils of the past. To my mind, this would not be a good thing, as our present system of law is designed to evolve dynamically through the creation of precedents in the case by case rulings of judges. This would have to be abandoned if the decisions were made by a jury, and I think this would have a stultifying effect on the law’s capacity to engage promptly with rapidly changing social circumstances (eg new questions of gay father’s rights to maintenance; or the status of promises on social media texts as binding contractually etc. )

Anyway, I waffle on, and off the subject of genealogy altogether :-)

I simply want to record my complete agreement with Sharon in the matter of 'judge plus assessors' versus 'judge and jury'. A glance at the history of US jurisprudence would reveal a significant number of absurd judgements manifestly based on counsel's ability to work on the emotions of those in the jury box.

Sharon - true. I am in agreement with your analysis.

"To my mind, this would not be a good thing, as our present system of law is designed to evolve dynamically through the creation of precedents in the case by case rulings of judges. This would have to be abandoned if the decisions were made by a jury, and I think this would have a stultifying effect on the law’s capacity to engage promptly with rapidly changing social circumstances (eg new questions of gay father’s rights to maintenance; or the status of promises on social media texts as binding contractually etc. )"

Although we have the jury system in Australia with precedents having been established in order to arrive at a ruling, I wonder at the law's capacity to rely on these precedents were our legal system of trial by jury to give way in the future to a ruling by Judge and assessors.

An interesting thought.