18 administration of justice’.28 In the long term, the admission of tortureinduced evidence can only have a corrosive effect on the criminal justice system. The public interest, in my view, demands its exclusion, irrespective of whether such evidence has an impact on the fairness of the trial. [37] For all these reasons I consider Ramseroop’s evidence relating to the Hilux and metal box to be inadmissible. Without this evidence the remaining evidence that the State presented is insufficient to secure convictions on count 2 (theft of the Hilux) and counts 4 and 5 (post office robbery). [38] What remains is only count 3 (theft of the Corolla). Turning to the appropriate sentence: the appellant was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment. However, he spent 23 months in custody awaiting trial, which must be taken into account in deciding on an appropriate sentence. I consider four years on this count to be appropriate. [39] What has happened in this case is most regrettable. The appellant, who ought to have been convicted and appropriately punished for having committed serious crimes, will escape the full consequences of his criminal acts. The police officers who carried the responsibility of investigating these crimes have not only failed to investigate the case properly by not following elementary procedures relating to the conduct of the identification parade, but have also, by torturing Ramseroop and probably also Zamani Mhlongo and Sithembiso Ngcobo, themselves committed crimes of a most egregious kind. They have treated the law 28 Per Lord Hoffman in A v Secretary of State for the Home Department (No.2) 2005 [UKHL] 71 para 87.