End of the Road for Cigarette Gang

Source from:  int.iol.co.za Karyn Maughan June 12 2008 06/12/2008

State witness Vernon Aspeling's six years of hell, in which he was shot and wounded and his 10-year-old son Liam kidnapped, has ended in the Cape High Court. Under heavy guard from witness protection officers, Aspeling reportedly became visibly emotional as Judge Lee Bozalek found that he had been a reliable "chief pillar" witness against the cigarette hijacking gang that he had once been a member of, and granted the 45-year-old indemnity from prosecution for his part in the crimes. Now, after Aspeling's evidence led to the conviction on Wednesday of all but three of the gang headed by brothers Selwyn and Virgil de Vries, The Star has learnt that police are renewing their investigation of two gang members alleged to have orchestrated Liam's kidnapping from jail. Liam was kidnapped a week before his father was due to start testifying against the gang, who were accused of hijacking cigarette delivery trucks in the Western and Eastern Cape in 2003. Judge Bozalek on Wednesday made no direct reference to Liam's kidnapping in his judgment, but commented on Aspeling's apparent lack of malice towards the cigarette gang members and strength as a witness. "This court had an extended opportunity to observe the witness. He was... clearly a man of considerable intelligence. He was, furthermore, articulate with a confident and assertive personality. "He appeared to bear no particular malice or resentment against the accused, despite oblique references to incidents which he regarded as threatening to his or his wife's safety and that of his son by his first marriage." Aspeling, the judge said in his 217-page judgment, had "impressed as someone who had decided to make a clean breast of things and was quite prepared to admit to the criminal actions in which he had been involved. "As far as accomplice witnesses are concerned, I have never previously encountered a witness who testified over so wide a terrain and in such great detail but with so little damage being done to his evidence." While noting that Aspeling's evidence was "not flawless", the judge said it contained "no material contradictions or inconsistencies" and had been corroborated by cellphone records. Sentencing procedures against the De Vries brothers, convicted stolen-cigarette buyer Achmat Mather, Julian van Heerden, Vernon Victor, Garry Williams, Llewelyn Smith and Francis Ngarinoma are scheduled to begin on August 18. State advocate Helene Booysen, who has led the state's case against the men, is currently also in possession of the Liam Aspeling kidnapping docket. It remains unclear whether police will pursue any case against the man who rescued the child - now one of the state's 30 witnesses in National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi's pending corruption trial. Liam was rescued by private investigator Machiel Andries Burger. The former police officer, who counts the Brett Kebble hitmen as his friends, is currently out on bail pending an appeal against his conviction and life sentence for the 2000 abduction and murder of 29-year-old Sandy Botomane. Enditem