Cape Town – At least 1 886 people have died in gang-related murders in Cape Town in the past five years, but there have only been 61 convictions, which is a conviction rate of 3%.
Gang-related murders have increased dramatically over the last five years, from 83 during 2011/12 to 408 last year.
This is according to statistics received from the national police in response to a parliamentary question by the DA.
According to the statistics provided, the most gang-related killings were recorded during the 2013/14 financial year, when 529 incidents were reported.
DA community safety spokesperson, Mireille Wenger, who had submitted the parliamentary questions relating to community safety, said the conviction rate for gang-related murders last year stood at 1%.
“My questions have gone to the MEC of community safety, Dan Plato, who has an oversight function over SAPS, so the police would provide him with the statistics and he would then hand those to us. So the replies that we have, can be taken as accurate,” Wenger said on Monday.
Dr Simon Howell, from UCT’s centre of criminology, said the conviction rates did not seem “immediately incorrect or inaccurate”.
“In relation to drug-related incarceration statistics, the figure is in the same ballpark,” Howell said. “It should be remembered that gangsterism is, in terms of criminal law, not that easy to define and so how one criminally defines a gang or gangster will play a role in defining the parameters of the statistics generated."
“In the same way, determining the contextual factors implicit in the definition of “gang-related murders” can be difficult, so influencing any statistics generated from the definition... Without seeing how the statistics were calculated, I can’t comment on their precise accuracy, but in comparing them with statistics from other crimes frequently associated with gangsterism, the figures do not seem immediately incorrect or inaccurate,” he said.
During 2015/16, more than 50% of murders which took place in Steenberg, Belhar and Elsies River were reported as gang-related.
Chairperson of the Belhar community policing forum (CPF), Kenneth Visser, said: “These stats are shocking, but police can’t fight crime alone. It’s very important that all stakeholders come on board to help police in combating crime; community members who have information have to come forward, the justice department must do their bit and so on.”
Lentegeur CPF chairperson Mark Brookes added: “In our area we’ve seen a lot of cases thrown out of court on technicalities. The community is also worried that bail is granted too easily to suspects because there’s no proper communication between prosecutors and detectives.”
Wenger said she would write to the Minister of Police Nkosinathi Nhleko to consider the reintroduction of the specialised policing units.
“The establishment of effective crime-fighting teams is now urgent, given the spread of gang violence to rural areas such as Worcester and the spread of gang-associated crimes such as poaching and drug sales,” she said.
Attempts to get comment from the police or the department of Justice were unsuccessful.