Captured along with his nephew, the , this nameless man is ultimately killed during his interrogation by . When explaining the man’s death, Joll says that his victim had grown violent during the (torture-filled) interrogation and, after a bit of a fight, hit his head fatally against a wall. Through this explanation, Coetzee perhaps satirizes the one offered by an officer who took part in killing/brutally torturing the anti-apartheid activist Steven Biko (see Background Information). The magistrate suspects that this man is the father of the .