By Yiep Joseph
The defense team for Dr. Riek Machar and the seven co-accused have questioned the digital expert report, citing that it contains irregularities. During the 50th session on Wednesday, Ratlhogo Peter Calvin, the South African forensic expert and the last prosecution witness, concluded the presentation of his report. The expert presented all that was extracted from the devices of the accused persons except Dr. Machar, whose devices were not accessed. He interrogated WhatsApp communications for seven of the accused and presented the findings of the investigations to the court one after another. In his findings, the expert alleged that most of the WhatsApp communications were linked with the Nasir incident. Peter claimed that some of the accused were involved in the purchase of ammunition as justified by their WhatsApp chats. After concluding his findings and last remarks on the forensic report, the original report was given to the judges with attachments, while a copy was given to the defense team. The prosecution team prayed to the court to mark the forensic report as a prosecution document. When given a chance to comment after going through the report, Dr. Machar’s defense team questioned it, claiming that there were irregularities in the forensic report. Deng John Deng, one of the defense lawyers, said there were differences in pages as well as the content between the original report and the copies. “There is different on pages and content of between original report and the copies” Deng told the court. “There is different in the content of the two reports for example, page four of original report of the first accused is different from the page 4 of the copy. And on original report of the second accused is 43 pages while the copy is 44 pages” he added. He called on the judges to give the defense team the original copy and time to go through the document in order to prepare for the cross-examinations. The prosecution team, however, claimed that the differences in pages and content may be from the presentations. They, however, admitted that the defense team be given copies but be study within the court premises. The presiding judge deferred the session to Friday, Feb. 13, when the forensic report will be formally submitted as a prosecution document, paving the way for the defense to cross-examine the expert on his findings. Dr. Machar and his SPLA-IO co-accused face charges including murder, conspiracy, terrorism, treason, destruction of public property, and crimes against humanity over the March 2025 attack on the SSPDF garrison in Nasir. Prosecutors allege SPLA-IO forces, allied with the White Army, killed 257 soldiers, including commander David Majur Dak, and destroyed or seized military equipment worth about $58 million.