AK-47 gang attack cops

Published Mar 30, 2015

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Johannesburg - Police officers came under fire on Monday morning after discovering a group of men wielding AK-47s and other firearms hiding out in the back of a truck in Kempton Park.

One officer was seriously wounded.

At about 4am on Monday, police officers stationed at OR Tambo International Airport were patrolling in the Kempton Park area when they found a truck parked on Albatross Street.

The officers noticed the front and back registration plates were different and there was no licence disc.

They asked the driver to step out and allow them to inspect the back of the vehicle.

According to provincial police spokesman Major Mac Mngomezulu, the truck driver made excuses as to why he couldn’t unlock the back, saying, for example, he didn’t have the key.

He contacted someone believed to be the vehicle’s owner.

Shortly, the man arrived in a grey bakkie.

But he, too, said he couldn’t open the back of the truck, and left.

Six men armed with AK-47s, then started firing from behind the closed door of the truck. The driver is believed to have tipped them off.

One officer was wounded in the lower body.

The men then opened the door and escaped in the parked police car. Clearly realising how conspicuous their getaway vehicle was, the group of criminals stopped on Pamona Road where they fired more shots and hijacked a Honda Ballade.

The gang then abandoned the police vehicle.

Mngomezulu said cartridges found at the scene indicated that the men were armed with pistols and AK-47s, but it’s unclear what such heavily-armed men were doing in the back of a truck in Albatross Street in the early hours of the morning.

The officer who was wounded during the brazen escape was immediately transported to Arwyp Medical Centre where he was stabilised.

On Sunday, two police officers were killed in a dramatic shootout in Modderfontein, where the occupants of a BMW refused to be pulled over and began shooting at the officers.

In reaction to the Modderfontein shooting on Monday, Police Minister Nkosinathi Nhleko said the nation could not simply stand by and watch as police men and women were slaughtered.

“The minister has condemned the dastardly act and called on the investigators to ensure they leave no stone unturned in finding the culprits,” said ministerial spokesman Musa Zondi.

While two officers were killed on Sunday in Modderfontein, according to provincial police spokeswoman Colonel Noxolo Kweza, the third, who was critically wounded, was stable.

The Star

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