Neil Aggett Death Inquest Gets Underway At Joburg High Court

Riyaz Patel

Almost 40 years after he died in police custody, the inquest into the death of anti-apartheid activist Neil Aggett will be reopened at the Johannesburg High Court Monday.

Aggett, a medical doctor and organiser for the Food and Canning Workers’ Union, was found hanged in his cell at what was then John Vorster Square police station in Johannesburg on February 5 1982. 

He had been in detention for 70 days after being arrested by the apartheid regime’s Security Branch.

In the late ’90s, the TRC heard a 1982 inquest into Aggett’s death, presided over by magistrate Pieter Kotze, declared that no one was to blame for his death.

This was in contrast to the evidence presented by the Aggett family’s lawyers, and the “no one to blame” verdict was overturned by the TRC.