The accused in the Joshlin Smith trial, Steveno van Rhyn, took the stand in the Western Cape High Court on Tuesday, detailing what he described as a brutal assault and kidnapping by men he believed to be police officers.
The testimony forms part of a trial-within-a-trial to determine whether statements made by the accused were obtained voluntarily.
The six-year-old went missing from her home in Middelpos, Saldanha Bay, on 19 February 2024. Her disappearance led to a high-profile investigation and the arrest of several suspects, including her mother, Racquel ‘Kelly’ Smith, her boyfriend Jacquen ‘Kelly’ Appollis, and their friend Van Rhyn.
They are facing kidnapping and human trafficking charges to which they pleaded not guilty.
Van Rhyn said the events unfolded on Monday, 4 March 2024, days after Joshlin’s disappearance.
“I came from court, saw my cousin’s boyfriend Couple, and we went to the hiking spot. A bakkie came, and we got into it,” he told the court.
His lawyer, Nobahle Mkabayi, questioned him about his condition at the time.
“Did you have painful knees, painful testicles or wrists, swollen elbows when you were hitchhiking?” she asked.
“Did your cousin’s boyfriend help you into the vehicle? Were you limping or in pain?”
“I had no injuries,” Van Rhyn replied.
Van Rhyn continued testifying that they were travelling from Vredenburg to Saldanha when the bakkie turned around at a traffic circle and returned to the Vredenburg direction.
There, another bakkie was waiting.
“They let Couple out, but they kept me. They took me to Jacobsbaai.”
He described being taken to a road that led to the beach.
“They stopped, took me to the back of the bakkie, handcuffed me, made me lie on my stomach, and assaulted me, and they pinched my testicles.
A white man came with two black men and said we didn’t belong there.”
Van Rhyn said that when he arrived at the beach, he had no injuries and had been walking normally. “A gun was placed in my mouth. I could feel it was not plastic but steel on my teeth,” he said.
Mkabayi asked how he felt at that moment.
Van Rhyn laughed before replying: “I didn’t lose hope because I thought maybe Couple would report what happened to my relatives. I thought they would kill me because they kidnapped me.”
Mkabayi asked him again about the pain he experienced.
“When your testicles were being pinched, how did you feel?”
“It was sore. It was the first time something like that happened. I don’t even know where they pressed, there are two testicles, and they pressed on the thing as well. They didn’t want to stop. My testicles are not where they were, they’re skewed.”
Asked if the men ever introduced themselves, Van Rhyn replied, “No. They just said I must not talk s**t.”
He added, “It was only afterwards that I realised I had been kidnapped.”
He said he was terrified not only because of the weapon but also because of what the men had told him.
“They said I’m going to dig my own grave or be thrown into the water. The area between the sea and the bushes made me think they were going to kill me. No one else knew where I was.”
Van Rhyn confirmed that his cousin’s boyfriend did not know where he had been taken or that he was being tortured.
He described the men who attacked him as older and well-built, “like sportspeople.”
He said that after the incident at the beach, he was taken to Sea Border police offices in Saldanha Bay, still in handcuffs.
When asked whether he had been informed that he would be interviewed, Van Rhyn said no.
He also disputed earlier testimony by Captain Wesley Lombard, who claimed Van Rhyn had been picked up in Diazville. “That’s not true,” he insisted.
He described another round of physical abuse at the Sea Border office.
“I was in the boardroom and was taken through a passage and told to sit down with my hands between my legs while still handcuffed. A white lady stood behind me.
“Two other officers who were beside me hit me, while the one behind me struck me very hard. I wasn’t allowed to look around. I felt dizzy from the blows. I sat like a statue.” He said he asked Sergeant Dawid Johannes Fortuin if he could go to the toilet.
“He told me, ‘You don’t want to talk, you’re wasting my time, I will hand you over to other people'."
He told the court that the blows did not stop, even when he felt dizzy.
Proceedings were postponed until Tuesday morning, when Van Rhyn is expected to continue his testimony.