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From: arthurg@is.co.za (Arthur Goldstuck)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: The poisoned dress
Date: Fri, 15 Mar 1996 07:26:24 GMT

A real-life variant of the poisoned dress took place in South Africa during the height of the apartheid era. Newspaper editor Donald Woods, who had befriended the Black Consciousness activist Steve Biko (later killed by security police during interrogation), was subjected to a long campaign of harassment from the government's "dirty tricks" department, before he was eventually banned by the government (meaning he had limited freedom oif movement, could not be in the same room as more than two other people, and could not be quoted anywhere). During this period, a parcel of T-shirts was delivered to his home for his children, supposedly by an anonymous well-wisher. When the kids tried them on, they began screaming in pain. It turned out the T-shirts had been saturated in poison. You can see a version of these events in the film Cry Freedom, which is based on Woods' book and is ostensibly the story of Steve Biko, but really Woods' own autobiography.

Arthur Goldstuck
http://www.legends.org.za/arthur