Staff Writer
TWO teenagers and a man overpowered two metro police officers yesterday, wounding one of them in the leg and robbing the other of her gun.
The three fled, but Nyanga police arrested the teen suspects. Their accomplice remains at large. The officers, aged 29 and 35, were working at a vehicle checkpoint near the intersection of Duinefontein Road and Govan Mbeki Drive yesterday, police spokesman FC van Wyk said.
“One of the attackers disarmed the woman officer and fired a shot at her colleague, hitting him in the lower leg.”
The city’s safety and security executive director, Richard Bosman, said the police were closing in on the third suspect.
The incident comes a week after an off-duty traffic department administrative official was wounded in the leg at his home in Kraaifontein by three men who demanded his firearm. The officer does not carry a gun. Two of the suspects were arrested soon after that incident, mayoral committee member for safety and security JP Smith said.
Seven attacks on police, traffic and law enforcement officers have been reported this year. In July, a metro policeman was shot three times in the leg when three men tried to steal his firearm in Khayelitsha.
A member of the city’s rapid response unit missed being wounded when she and a colleague were ambushed outside the Moses Mabhida Library in Site C, Khayelitsha, in June. A traffic officer was wounded when he came under fire from robbers wanting his firearm outside his home in Mitchells Plain two months ago.