Cape Town - The Department of Community Safety’s court watching briefs project has resulted in at least 70 cases of disciplinary action against policemen in the province for the year in review.
The pilot project was introduced in 2013 to identify and report the systemic failures and challenges within the police department relating to criminal court cases.
Tabling his department’s annual report before the provincial parliament’s standing committee on community safety on the police’s annual report on Thursday, MEC Dan Plato said his department received a clean audit for a sixth consecutive year. He said it spent 99 percent of its budget and under-spent R298 000 because of the late filling of posts.
Plato listed the project as a major success in exposing the percentage of cases being struck off the court roll because of poor police performance.
He said in the new financial year the project would be made a permanent function of the department and would be rolled out to at least 25 courts.
ANC MPL Richard Dyantyi wanted to know if the police viewed the watching briefs as “a nuisance”.
In response, community safety head of department Gideon Morris said it would be difficult to say if the oversight function was a nuisance. He said the provincial police had responded very well to the project.
Morris said that for the year under review the department, through its watching briefs, monitored 243 cases in five magistrates’ courts.
“The latest report shows that at one court there were a number of people arrested for the possession of illegal firearms – yet four months down the line the investigation was not concluded and the matters were struck off the roll.”
Plato said that between April and June, the unit observed 28 court cases, including cases of possession of firearms, aggravated robbery, murder and attempted murder, where policing inefficiencies were revealed.
“Between October 2013 and March 2014, the unit has monitored hundreds of cases and identified 71 which were removed from the court roll due to inefficiencies from the police.”
The ANC wanted to know when the unit would be tracking court cases in areas such as Khayelitsha and Nyanga, where the “real problems” are.
ANC MPL Pat Lekker questioned the department on the lack of CCTV cameras, saying they would assist in crime hotspots and would even make for reliable, physical evidence in serious and violent crime cases.
Morris gave the assurance that once fully established, the programme would be expanded and rolled out to more courts.
Cape Argus