How I found Susan - Jason Rohde's court demonstration
Second day on the stand for murder accused
Image: Aron Hyman
The bathroom door that concealed Susan Rohde’s body could have been locked or unlocked using a teaspoon or a coin. But murder accused estate agency boss Jason Rohde told the Cape Town high court on Tuesday that he could not have known this.
On his second day in the witness stand‚ Rohde was emphatic that his wife locked the bathroom door from the inside before committing suicide by hanging herself with a hair-iron cord.
“Susan locked that bathroom door‚ I did not lock that bathroom door from the outside‚” he said.
Stepping out of the witness box to the front of the court where the bathroom door had been set up‚ Rohde demonstrated the position in which he found Susan’s body.
But he also insisted his wife would never have committed suicide‚ a narrative in tune with the “fighter” he has described at length during his testimony.
“Not in a million years would I believe Susan would have committed suicide‚” he said.
Property mogul Jason Rohde demonstrated in the Cape Town High Court how he had found Susan’s body. Rohde is accused of murdering his wife in 2016. Rohde insists he found his wife’s lifeless body hanging from the bathroom door of their hotel room.
He was describing the circumstances leading up to the point at which he discovered Susan’s body in the bathroom of their Spier wine estate hotel room in July 2016. The couple were enroiled in a bitter fight the entire evening before she was allegedly murdered.
Rohde explained how he physically struggled with his wife after a black-tie event which he hosted as CEO of the Lew Geffen Sotheby’s International Realty‚ at its annual conference in Stellenbosch.
He said that twice during a physical confrontation with her he made contact with Susan’s face while trying to loosen her hands from his jersey.
He also grabbed her by the throat in order to get her out of the way‚ and in an attempt to shrug her off he pushed her into a flower bed.
The case continues.
