G’town woman hijacked, murdered

The stats about the death penalty not working in other countries is a fair comment but we need to also remember that the people committing serious crimes in those countries are normally mentally unstable, in our country we have people committing the crimes because they can. The death penalty also has it flaws, like if a person is innocent and is found guilty of the crime… Prisons in SA are already overcrowded so even an improved justice department is not going to fix that, if anything it means that there will be more space required in our already full prisons. Now I am not suggesting death penalty to overcome that problem but rather to use it as a massive deterrant and you also have to be realistic about implementation. I say, if you are a REPEAT offender of Murder, Rape or Armed robbery. So that implies that the first time you do it you get to go to jail and if you get out and you do it again, well then you have used up your chances. Turning the cheek gets you so far but we only have 2 cheeks

Sure thing, Patrick, I am glad we are in agreement. The police under apartheid were militarised, and viewed themselves more as “soldiers of the state” rather than protectors and servants of the people.
I am alarmed at the moves to return the police to being a paramilitary force (together with military ranks). I do not believe our country needs this kind of approach to upholding the law. We need a professional, politically neutral, police force dedicated to protecting individual rights — otherwise our constitution is in serious risk of becoming meaningless.

I’m with Paddy S on this one, but ….

First of all, train the cops to catch the villains.
Secondly, train, equip and empower the justice system employees to bring the apprehended villains to justice.
Thirdly, train, equip and empower the Correctional Services employees to keep the villains behind bars.
Fourthly, make prisons a place to be feared, not a place where once-caught villains get training in how to avoid being caught again.
And lastly, if a cop needs to shoot to save his own life being taken, then let him shoot! But let him be held to account for his actions as a matter of course.

I Feel real scared to be living in grahamstown right now because this is the first time crime has been so hectic

Mike,

I unconditionally apologise in the event of me confusing you with another blogger. Sorry, my mate.

I am also a supporter of individual rights and the right to protection by and from the Law, and it is in this vein that i vehemently oppose this barbaric scream for the police to become investigaing officer, judge and executioner in a democratic society. I am glad to see that more and more prominent persons are now supporting my view. We cannot allow a gungho approach to policing to be introduced just to clamour to public sentiment. No, there are other alternatives to Dirty Harry tactics as i have alluded on previous blogs.

Once again, i sincerely apologise for confusing you with some-one else.

I hope that my apology will be accepted.

@ Patrick … please let me know of a single blog posting of mine supporting the “shoot to kill” policy. I have never supported it, and never will.
If you don’t know by now, let me say unequivocally: I am a fervent supporter of individual rights and the rule of law. I am absolutely diametrically opposed to communist (or communal) rights taking precedent over individual rights. I am absolutely opposed to communist dictatorship through centralised decision-making.
Individual rights and rule of law are the antithesis of communism and dictatorship.

Stephen, bulls**t, my China. The worst mass murderer in British history was a pale-faced English doctor.

Ama-zing,

And that someone should stop war-talk and rather concentrate on education, training and community participation.

If we stop buying stolen goods, stop hiding our relatives who by our knowledge is involve in criminal activity, if we picket courts and testify as friends of the courts to prevent accused from getting bail, harass investigating officers, demand service from all, then we are halfway there.

This whole problem can be summed up in one short sentence: “In South Africa, crime really does pay”. Until this changes, it will only get worse. The solution has been outlined by Bron & Mike. Now we just need to find someone in power who sees this and is able to affect this much needed change.

in the uk a road accident would make the news , but sadly that was several years ago. since we opened our gates to poor countries , all types of horrendous crime is on the increase. these people who have nothing also have no understanding of basic morals. is the answer help or death. you cannot help those who do not wish to be helped so for them the only answer is their death and put us out of their misery

@Patrick. You’ve just noted another problem. The level of training.

When I did national service we were rigourously trained in fire-arm safety. The purpose of any fire-arm is to kill – end of story. Therefore we were indoctrinated with a culture of using minimum force (I suspect you might not agree with me – we seem to have been on different sides).

You only pick up a fire-arm if you intend to load it. You only load it if you are prepared to fire it. You only fire it if you are prepared to kill. “Shoot to wound” is a Hollywood fiction. The body has far too many vital organs and blood vessels.

We don’t know all the facts behind the tragic shooting, but that anybody can believe that such a small child is about to shoot them and then shoots as a first resort instead of as a last resort, indicates woefully inadequate training.

Bron, i do not beleive that allowing a MUDERER and RAPIST and worse to languish behind bars for 15 years is going to do anything to deter the crime. These ******** will get their 3 meals a day, and hell, if they feel inclined they can even get a law degree while on a holiday paid for by us tax payers. I stand by my comment, and agree with Rose – i would also not hesitate to shoot someone who laid a hand on my family. And it is time people realised that the only way to stop crime like this is to fight it – yes, brutally. These pieces of trash do not give their victims a second thought, so why should we do it for them?

@Opstoker. Probably not. But the same can be said of every single one of us on these blogs.

Albert Pierrepoint, who conducted more executions than any other British hangman, turned abolitionist.

The big problem is that it is impossible to prove a negative. If no murders have been commited, was it the death penalty, was it a better standard of living or did we suddenly all “see the light?’

Meanwhile, real people are victims of real rapes and real murders.

I think Bron & Mike have, between them, put their collective finger on the root problem. A culture of respect for law and a professional, impartial administration of justice. S.A. lacks both.

Mike,

But on previous postings all you advocates of the gallows questioned my opposition to the ‘’shoot to kill”mentality? Where art thou consistency now when sanity seems to be starting to prevail?

Especially after the shooting of a 3 year- old child playing with a pipe.

Mike,

But on previous postings all you advocates of the gallows questioned my opposition to the ‘’shoot to kill”mentality? Where art thou consistency?

Dave, I doubt whether Syd Dernley’s book on the effectiveness of the death penalty was subjected to the rigours of peer review to validate and replicate his “findings”.

Phole, the solutions are: to attract talent to a professional and depoliticised police service and retain it, to upgrade your investigative and forensic services, to sort out your justice system (e.g. the EL courts!!) and make sure that criminals don’t get away with it – whatever “it” is, even spitting on the sidewalk (that’s what “zero tolerance” means: it doesn’t mean shooting to kill only when you’re chasing suspected murderers or cash-in-transit robbers, it actually means making sure that people stop offending by effectively and uncompromisingly enforcing the law – the so-called “broken-windows theory”).

How can any self-respecting professional policeman/woman feel good having a Commissioner like Joker Selebi or Cowboy Cele in charge? How can traffic cops do their jobs “without fear or favour” when Malema is caught speeding and they are immediately intimidated by the powers that be?

I’ll say it once again: we are almost at the point (if we have not reached it already) where the falcon cannot hear the falconer any longer in this country.

I don’t think it’s a question of the punishment. I believe conditions in an SA prisons are far from “rewarding”. It’s a question of arrest and conviction.
We do not have enough policemen who are paid and skilled sufficiently to do their job efficiently, and when criminals are caught, they go into a criminal justice system that is so badly run they have a slim chance of being convicted — again because the officials are insufficiently paid or skilled to do the work.
SA is becoming a criminal haven because the risk of being a criminal in this country is so much lower than elsewhere.
As long as senior officials of the police and justice systems are appointed on the basis of their ANC loyalties and not on their professional abilities, the problem will not be solved.
Commissioner Cele’s absurd “shoot to kill” policy is not going to be the answer. It will just result in more innocent people being slaughted in the name of the “war on crime” and the poice becoming increasingly alienated and militant, and less able to detect and arrest criminals.

Choose your surveys carefully. Surveys have also shown that states in the U.S. that do not have the death penalty tend to impose longer sentences than states that do have the death penalty. Nobody wants to pass a death sentence and, once you start looking for mitigating circumstances, it tends to snowball. Result: death penalty states tend to be more merciful than non-death penalty states.

Does it curb crime? Considering how many murderers and rapists in S.A. are on bail for similar crimes or have served sentences for similar crimes, execution would have prevented all subsequent crimes committed by those criminals.

Syd Dernley was Britain’s last surviving hangman when he published his autobiography “A Hangman’s Tale”. He argued that criminals respected the death penalty and that the incidence of violent crime was lower when it was practiced. As he put it, a prison holds the rowdiest and least disciplined members of society, but on the morning of a hanging the prison was silent. The crash as the trap was opened was heard and remembered by the people who most needed to.

When hanging was still practiced in S.A. did we have child and baby rape? Were people murdered for cellphones? Just asking.

I agree with opstoker. The surveys in America have shown that the death penalty doesn’t actually have that much of an effect in curbing murders. But if we have harsher penalties for criminals, like manual labour while in prison and not receiving money and cigarettes and three nice meals a day with tv etc etc. If going to jail was actually a punishment and not a reward as it seems that it is, then maybe the crime rate will go down.

At no point did I say ‘forgive’ and have even stated ‘no compassion for the criminals’, but you chose to read only the points you can get a reaction out of… My point iS that its time to start being PRO-ACTIVE instead of REACTIVE!

I agree with Opstoker – “90% arrest and conviction rate, and 90% of murderers/rapists would therefore be certain to spend 15 years to life behind bars, then the rate of violent crime would be reduced immediately and massively” What are you teaching YOUR kids by walking around with this trigger-happy bravado? Let’s watch our own actions, before we start shouting vigilantism! An eye for an eye makes you no better than them..

Opstoker, please don’t tantalise. I agree with your exposition fully about the human desire for retribution etc, but what do you offer as a solution to turn the ability of the police around?

Rose, if I got the chance, and I knew I would get away with it, I would do the same, and have a quiet cup of tea afterwards.

To illustrate: of all the crimes to which I referred above, only one perpetrator was caught, and the docket was “lost”. So there are violent criminals, including arsonists and a rapist/murderer, walking around somewhere.

The only way to get around people literally getting away with murder is if the families of serious & violent crime victims take the law into their own hands. I would feel NOTHING to kill someone that has brutally raped or murdered anyone in my family.

Pity the debate almost always dumbs down to a very superficial level, and then sticks to it – like saying “this is Africa, the Western ways don’t work” (Kevin), when in fact, China and the US execute much more than Africa does. Does it “work” there? That’s a difficult question, which the stats suggest is normally answered “No”. Of course, we are human, and we crave retribution/revenge – so let’s not hide behind the false argument that it’s to reduce crime.

Before you all get on your high horses and say that I couldn’t talk like this if I was a victim, my own extended household has experienced criminal arson, assault, attempted murder, rape and murder – so think again.

The real problem is a culture of impunity – it’s more a matter of not getting caught at all, than exactly what punishment will be imposed (death or imprisonment). If the cops had a 90% arrest and conviction rate, and 90% of murderers/rapists would therefore be certain to spend 15 years to life behind bars, then the rate of violent crime would be reduced immediately and massively.

Can’t agree more Kevin…..ALL TO THE GALLOWS!!!

I agree with Eugene !!

Bron, wait until something like this happens to one of your family , and let us see if you still have the same forgiving attitude. Just imagine the last few hours of that womans life, and the torment she probably went through, and then tell us to have compassion.The police should not even bring these animals to court – they should be shot where they are found and left there to rot.

An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth breads contempt and hatred. The Bible teaches us to turn the other cheek. Maybe a little more of compassion in life and a little less hatred will start turning our nation around. And no I don’t mean compassion to the criminals. I mean teaching our kids from an early age to rather turn the other cheek than an eye for an eye. I dont know – I don’t have answers when it comes to terrible senseless murders like this.Condolences to this poor womans family.

Only one way to put a stop to this ****. March them off to the gallows. Its about time we stop hiding behind the guise of human rights. If criminals choose to ignore your rights then by goodness we should ignore theirs. This is africa and western approach doesnt work, we need to send a message that this will NOT be tolerated and only then will we stem the tide.

Oh man, this poor woman’s family. Imagine the type of evening they will be having this evening. I don’t even want to try and think what fear she must have been feeling up until the time they killed her.

What was this for? Why take someone’s life? If they wanted the car, why kill her? Just take the car! Also, why abandon the car if they wanted it?

Society is getting sicker by the minute! Too many sickos out there and not enough dedicated cops!

Sies !Is there no end to these monstrosities?