COURT was briefly adjourned when the mother of a nine-year-old ‘victim’ ran out of the Port Shepstone Regional Court room, crying hysterically and holding her mouth like she wanted to vomit.
She had been testifying in the high-profile trial of former Hibiscus Coast Municipality Protection Services senior traffic officer, Dave Middleton.
This was after state prosecutor, Muziwoduma Miza, showed her the photographs that she had allegedly found on Middleton’s phone. Regional magistrate, Johann Bester, together with his two assessors, adjourned the case to tomorrow (Friday) morning.
Middleton faces 34 charges including rape, sexual assault, sexual grooming of a child, display and exposure of child pornography and intimidation.
Before this, the mother of the other ‘victim’, a 14-year-old girl, took to the stand and told the court that Middleton had apologised for taking photographs of her daughter, without informing her.
He then approached her again, to take photographs of her daughter for advertising brands. She agreed, and chose two dresses for her to wear.
She said Middleton approached her (the mother) when he heard that she was going to the University of North West, and said he would look after the children while she was away.
Two weeks later, on the afternoon she returned, her daughter arrived home with her luggage, a DVD of photos, and a cellphone that was given to her.
She then overheard her daughter on the phone to Middleton, shortly after her daughter and her deceased sister’s son (who she was planning to adopt), had returned from staying at Middleton’s home.
Both the children had attended karate classes at Middleton’s dojo.
She said that she had overheard her daughter replying to the person on the other side of the phone, with ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers and ‘no, I won’t, I swear on my mother’s life’.
She said that when she asked her daughter who she had been talking to, she said ‘Dave’.
The mother said she could sense ‘something was amiss’, and she questioned her daughter further.
She said her daughter had then told her that Middleton had phoned her, and told her not tell her mother that nude photos had been taken by the first mother (of the nine-year-old girl) while in the garden, but that the photos were taken by her cousin while the phone was unattended.
She said her daughter had also told her that Middleton had told her the photographs were now in the hands of the police, and that he didn’t know how the photos had been transferred from the mother’s phone to his phone to the police’s phone.
Under cross-examination by Middleton’s attorney Jimmy Howse, the mother of the 14-year-old told the court how the relationship between the two mothers had broken down, after she found out her sister’s son had been visiting the mother of the nine-year-old girl home, and had been asked to do chores and that in return she would pay for his karate classes.
