Pretoria - A Sunnyside grandmother is claiming R1 million damages from the police following a harrowing ordeal in which she says she was manhandled by officers and locked up in a cell because she pepper-sprayed someone she perceived to be an intruder, but who turned out to be her neighbour.
The police this week accepted full liability for the damages suffered by 69-year-old Floris Engelbrecht. The court will at a later stage deliver judgment as to how much she should receive.
Engelbrecht, a pensioner who lives in Mears Street, claimed damages in the Pretoria High Court for unlawful arrest and incarceration, after she had spent nearly 24 hours in a filthy police cell. According to her she was also manhandled by several police officers.
She was charged with common assault after the incident. The neighbour later withdrew the charge.
Her nightmare ordeal started in the early hours of November 6, 2008, when she woke up to great deal of noise outside. Unbeknown to her at the time, the police were chasing a robber in the complex and most of the residents were gathered in the passages. Her son, who lived with her, was also outside at the time.
“I woke up, opened my front door and shouted ‘shut-up, I want to sleep’, as I had to work the next day. I saw lots of people outside.”
Engelbrecht said she closed the door and took her pepper-spray out of her handbag, just in case of any trouble. “A friend gave me the spray as I caught a naked man at my bedside some years ago,” she told the Pretoria News. “As I turned around I saw someone trying to kick my door open. I opened the door and someone tried to punch me through the security door. I managed to duck, but I sprayed the pepper-spray aiming at the ground, before I slammed the door closed.”
Engelbrecht tried to phone the police when she heard a woman shouting outside. Her son, meanwhile, came into the flat. By that time, she had managed to get through to the Sunnyside police station and had told them there was trouble.
She had hardly put down the phone, when three or four police officers stormed into her flat.
“One of them grabbed my arm and said ‘come, you are wasting my f*****g time’. They did not tell me what it was about, but only said I was under arrest. I was still in my pyjamas and asked whether I could change. I went to my bedroom and I had just removed my pyjama pants, when a policeman stormed into my bedroom. He pulled me and again said ‘come, you are wasting my time’. I fell across the bed and he left.”
Engelbrecht said when she left the room, the officer was in front of the door and pulled her towards the front door.
“My son wanted to know whether he could accompany me, but the policeman said if he moved, he would shoot him vrek (dead).”
According to her, the policeman tried to drag her down the stairs, but she insisted that they take the lift, as she had a bad hip.
“I was pushed into the police van and when we took off, I realised I was in deep trouble. I kicked my feet into position against the sides and held on for dear life, because we raced through the streets. The policeman at intervals applied the brakes, making it a journey out of hell.”
At the Sunnyside police station she was made to sit in a room for what felt like hours. A cop came to take her watch and she saw it was quarter past three.
“I sat there for some time, before someone took me to the cells. I was told to take a blanket, from a pile of dirty blankets. I chose the cleanest, which was smelly and bloodstained. I was placed in a cell with three sleeping women.”
Engelbrecht said two of the women left early that morning and she and the other woman, who was in for assault, sat talking. “She asked me why I was there and I said I had no idea.”
She was told at about 1pm that she could go home, but that she had to be in the Hatfield Community Court the next day.
“I had to walk the five blocks with my bad hip to my flat, as there were no police vehicles to take me home.”
She appeared in court on three occasions. Her neighbour, during her fourth appearance, withdrew the charge.
“I was terrified and I still get nightmares. The moment I see a policeman, I start shaking and cry. It was the first time I had anything to do with the police and it was traumatic.
“I shudder to think the policeman came into my bedroom while I was undressing. To me a bedroom and a bathroom are private spaces.”
Engelbrecht said for her it was not all about the money, but about justice.
“I want the government’s eyes to open about what the police are doing.”
Pretoria News