Vergenoeg resident Glenwyl Michaels doesn't know how to go on with his life after he claims he was sent to prison without a fair trial and was branded as a rapist during his time behind bars – literally. Against his will he had the prison gang number ‘26’ tattooed onto his arm, he said, and now that he's been acquitted and released from the Grahamstown Correctional Facility, his community still judges him by the marks of his past.
Vergenoeg resident Glenwyl Michaels doesn't know how to go on with his life after he claims he was sent to prison without a fair trial and was branded as a rapist during his time behind bars – literally. Against his will he had the prison gang number ‘26’ tattooed onto his arm, he said, and now that he's been acquitted and released from the Grahamstown Correctional Facility, his community still judges him by the marks of his past.
The 22-year-old spent 11 months in jail, starting in April 2010, after being wrongfully accused as one of the men who gang-raped a school girl in an abandoned house in Fitchat Street at the beginning of that month. Since then he said his life has been a “living nightmare”. But it seems to have been a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time that earned Michaels this ordeal.
On 16 April 2010, he was in the Grahamstown Magistrate's court for a case of car theft on the same day that his friend, Jamie de Jager, was also in court because he had been accused of being one of the men who had raped the school girl.
Outside the court, where Michaels said he was waiting to greet his friend, picketers were toyi-toying against de Jager's bail. According to Michaels, this is when the victim pointed a finger at him, implicating him in the crime. He was quickly arrested and taken in to join de Jager in the rape case, where it was ruled with no physical evidence against both young men, that they wouldn't be allowed bail.
They had to wait out their trial dates in prison. Eleven months later Michaels and de Jager were found not guilty in the Grahamstown high court when the real rapists were arrested, and he said he had tried to get on with his life. But being known as a rapist in his community has made that impossible. “Children come to my house and swear at me,” he said. “No one will hire me even though I am trying to change.”
Previously, Michaels had been caught stealing, which might explain the magistrate’s ‘no-bail’ ruling as a criminal record diminishes a person’s chances of getting bail. And defence attorney Marius Wolmarans explained that when a rape victim swears under oath that they recognise someone as their rapist, the police have to accept that as evidence.
Michaels's father, Henry, acknowledges his son's past run-ins with the law but still feels that his son’s time in jail was unjust and has made their lives more difficult. “I know he used to smoke mandrax and steal,” Henry said, “but my son would never rape.” A Grahamstown police captain said that when a community is outraged by a horrific crime they often want to see a bad guy put behind bars, regardless of the facts surrounding the case.
On that fateful day in April 2010, Michaels was one of those men who got the blame. “The community are our greatest ally,” said police captain Milanda Coetzee, but this doesn't mean that there was no negligence on behalf of the police when Michaels was locked up.
If Michaels went straight from his arrest into court without any questioning, as he claims, that warrants its own examination, she added. The defendant has the right to sue for unlawful arrest as well as lay a civil claim, Coetzee said. But when Henry went to the Beaufort Street police station last week to get his son's case number to lay a claim, he was denied this information.
Police officers said he was not entitled to the case number. So Michaels is stuck in a rut and as long as the community remembers him as a rapist, he is branded. “I want to do something with my life and be able to look after my mother and father,” he said with tears in his eyes. “I just want to try and forget this thing… but I can’t.”
How to take legal action if you are unfairly jailed Know your rights
Knowing your legal rights is the first step to being able to take action. If you have spent time in jail and were found not guilty, you may lay a civil claim for compensation against the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Social Services.
For this you need your case number and must speak to a lawyer. You must include in the civil suit your claims of unlawful arrest or negligence.
If you think the police have treated you badly you can lay a civil case with a lawyer against this specific person/people.
•Everyone who is arrested has the right to be informed of the reason for their arrest
•Everyone has the right to legal advice
•Everyone has the right to appeal the court’s decision
•Everyone has the right to a fair and public trial. Legal aid organisations in Grahamstown: Generally, if you earn under R5 500 per month you are entitled to free legal representation.
•Legal Aid, 71 High Street
•Rhodes University Law Clinic
•Legal Resources Centre, 116 High Street
•Grahamstown Justice Centre, 22 Hill Street
•Human Rights Advice Line: 0860 120 120.
