NELSPRUIT – The man who was accused of trying to inject his ex-girlfriend with his blood, has been found not guilty of assault. On Tuesday, magistrate Mr NK Makhaya ruled that Ms Iris da Silva was a single witness and that the state’s case did not prove Mr Lismore Basson guilty without reasonable doubt.
Basson was initially charged with assault to do grievous bodily harm after Da Silva accused him of attacking her with a syringe in February. At the time, police indicated that the charges could be escalated to attempted murder if Da Silva was found to be HIV positive. Following two blood tests, Basson pleaded not guilty to the assault charge.
In his ruling, Makhaya said that the state’s evidence did not corroborate Da Silva’s claims. When Basson’s trial began in the Nelspruit Regional Court on August 19, Da Silva testified that Basson met her at her car at Makro, where she worked, on the morning of February 1.
She said he injected her once with a syringe filled with blood and tried to do it a second time but she pulled away. She said he told her he was giving her HIV. It was put to Da Silva that her testimony contradicted her statement to the police, wherein she said he had stabbed her twice.
She explained that she was not “full-minded” at the time of giving her statement to the police and insisted that Basson had tried to do it twice. In his ruling, Makhaya found that she had told the court she was not sober at the time of making her statement to the police.
During the trial, the state called four other witnesses. Mr Jacques Meiring, operational head of Bossies Community Justice, testified that he had confronted Basson with the allegation the same day at Wimpy, after being alerted by a colleague of Da Silva, Mr Rudi Smith.
“He said it was his own blood and it was only to make her sweat a little,” Meiring testified. “Basson said he threw it (the syringe) out of the bakkie when they left Makro.”
Mr Corné du Toit testified that he had driven Basson to Makro that day and waited in the car while Basson approached Da Silva. “On the way back from Makro I saw the accused throwing something out of the window,” he said.
Makhaya found that Du Toit was not sure that he had seen an injection. “He could not say what exactly was thrown out. The accused’s allegation that it was a pen can not be denied,” he ruled.
Du Toit said he dropped Basson off in town and immediately went to the police. Makhaya ruled that it was Du Toit who initially complained to the police. Smith in turn testified that he had accompanied Meiring to Wimpy. “The accused confessed to us that he had injected her with his own blood,” he said.
Last week, the doctor who had examined Da Silva the same day, testified that she did not see any external injuries on the latter, but that it did not mean that the complainant has not been assaulted. Makhaya found that none of the witnesses saw the attack and that all their testimonies depended on what Da Silva had told them.
In his own defence, Basson testified that he went to see Da Silva as there were a number of unresolved issues between them. He admitted that Da Silva had a protection order against him at the time. During the trial, she obtained another protection order against Basson. He is not to contact her, her daughter or her mother directly, or through a third party.
