Cape Town - The City’s Law Enforcement Officers are reportedly hot on the heels of a suspect who stole a tourist’s cellphone on Sunday in the Bo-Kaap area.
Officers on patrol witnessed a suspect grab a phone from a tourist and jump in a waiting vehicle. This resulted in a high-speed chase through the streets of the Cape Town CBD.
The suspect then jumped from the vehicle and ran into the Company Gardens, where he tried to discard the evidence, tossing the phone into the gardens while still trying to evade capture.
Eckardt Winks, executive support officer in the City’s Safety and Security Directorate, said the driver of the vehicle managed to flee before the corresponding units arrived. They had the vehicle’s details and were on the lookout for the vehicle.
However, the officers were determined to bring the suspect to book, he said. They apprehended the suspect and managed to retrieve the stolen cellphone from where it had been discarded.
The suspect is now in custody and was handed over to the SAPS at Cape Town Central police station. He will face charges of robbery, resisting arrest, assault of a peace officer, and contravening the Immigration Act.
The City’s Mayco member for Safety and Security, Alderman JP Smith, said they “started having all these additional incidents in the CBD” when all the parolees were released in August.
“From October till the last week in December, we had about 36 incidents in the CBD, mountain and surrounding areas but we had some solid arrests.
“We have large numbers of visitors related to tourism and domestic visitors, but the big problem is they won’t open cases.
“About 70% of the cases where we arrested somebody or caught someone and returned the items, the visitors refused to open a case, so that remains a big headache.
“The victims feel they are not coming back or they don’t want to waste time on their holiday with that. So that makes it hard to pursue the case against these individuals, so they just carry on doing what they are doing.”