Eighteen months into the investigation, no charges have been brought over thefts at the vehicle pound in Prospecton.
|||Durban - A police task team set up to investigate a spate of thefts at the vehicle pound in Prospecton – where criminals colluded with crooked cops to strip cars of their parts – have been unable to bring criminal charges against anyone.
This was confirmed by police spokesman Colonel Vincent Mdunge, who said only one policeman had been dismissed from the SAPS following a Daily News exposé 18 months ago.
The newspaper revealed that criminal syndicates were working with policemen at the pound and had stripped dozens of VW Golfs and Toyotas, stealing their dashboards, airbags, computer units, batteries and mag wheels.
They had taken advantage of broken CCTV cameras at the south Durban Vehicle Safeguarding Unit to get away with their crimes, angering scores of people who had been told their stolen vehicles had been recovered, only to find they had been stripped while in the police’s care.
Following the Daily News reports, police management set up a task team to investigate the thefts, promising that “heads will roll”.
Mdunge said the investigation led to three policemen being moved from the pound to other stations in the province.
“There was no evidence that could hold water against those three officers and that is why they were moved.”
They were now performing normal police duties, he said. Three other policemen had faced disciplinary hearings, he said.
Mdunge described the policemen who had been moved as “junior officers”.
“There was just speculation of their involvement and it was decided to remove them and replace them.”
Of the three who faced disciplinary hearings, one was cleared of all charges, one was dismissed and the other’s case was continuing, Mdunge said.
“The management structure of the pound has also changed and we have brought in new blood.
“The entire system of booking in and checking out vehicles has also been changed and improved. We have also fixed up all the broken CCTV cameras and they are all working.”
There had been no incidents of theft at the pound since the Daily News articles, Mdunge said.
It was not the first time cars had been stripped at the pound.
The Daily News reported in 2000 that the stripping of cars kept there for owner verification had been taking place for years.
At the time the police promised to deal with the problem.
A pilot project was initiated to privatise all of the country’s police pounds to bring an end to the car-stripping syndicates’ operations.
Commenting on the outcome of the task team probe, the DA’s spokeswoman on policing, MP Dianne Kohler Barnard, said it was inexcusable that a full-on investigation had managed to unearth virtually nothing.
“This is the sort of issue the Scorpions would have been able to deal with effectively,” she said.
“What we are increasingly seeing are cases that would normally have the average citizen behind bars, being treated lightly by police management when a policeman is involved,” she said.
“Officers are simply moved to other stations and there are literally thousands of police members with criminal records still employed by the police.
“Criminality is not dealt with seriously enough by the police.”
Daily News