Bully policewoman found guilty of assault

File photo: Doctor Ngcobo

File photo: Doctor Ngcobo

Published Feb 5, 2015

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Durban - A metro policewoman has been convicted of assault after she bullied, unlawfully arrested and then kicked a prosecutor who photographed her driving while using a cellphone.

“You are trying to take my bread away from me… I will rearrange your face,” policewoman Thulisile Zondi shouted at Durban prosecutor Nontobeko Biyela.

Biyela was sitting with her doctor husband in their car in Anton Lembede (Smith) Street when Zondi drove past in a large vehicle, ferrying several women officers, in May 2013.

Zondi was convicted by Durban magistrate Garth Davis last week and will be sentenced later this month.

In her evidence, Biyela said that as the metro vehicle went past they saw Zondi with the phone “and we joked about the police breaking the law, yet if it were someone else they would be given a ticket”.

Almost immediately the metro vehicle stopped and then reversed. Zondi asked why she was taking photographs and Biyela denied it.

According to her evidence during the trial, this made Zondi more angry and she got out, followed by three or four colleagues, and approached her, shouting and gesticulating.

One of the officers suggested she delete the photograph, which she did.

But this just made them angrier as it seemed to confirm that she had taken a photograph.

“I tried to pacify them by saying I was not trying to take away their bread… but was only taking it for social media and I was not going to take it to (metro police) headquarters.

“But they called me (a) liar.

“I told them I work for the NPA, but they said I was lying and I was a journalist. I showed them my appointment card, but that only made it worse. They said I thought I was too educated.”

Biyela apologised but was told she had to go to the metro vehicle and apologise to the others inside.

Thinking this would help she went, but was told by officers there that if she was truly sorry she would lick the floor of the vehicle. She refused.

They told her: “Because you work for the NPA you think you’re everything. We told you in the car, the NPA is nothing. We will show you.”

Zondi then told her she was being arrested and she would “rearrange” her face at the station.

She was placed in a metro police van and driven the 500m to the Broad Street police station. There she was introduced as a “prosecutor who is rude to police, undermines them and thinks she is more educated than anybody else”.

She was made to stand for nearly three hours while they drafted and redrafted statements. At one stage, exhausted, she sat down.

Zondi kicked her twice on her thigh and told her to get up. Biyela was then handcuffed through the bars of the grille – so she could not sit down – to a woman who had been arrested for heroin.

She was eventually detained at the Durban Central police station, from where she was released at 9.30 that night after the intervention of a General Naidoo.

She was never prosecuted.

Zondi, in her evidence, said they had stopped only to issue a fine as Biyela was parked on a yellow line.

She said Biyela insulted her and was arrested for crimen injuria.

However, she was unable to explain why she had also charged Biyela with obstruction of justice and resisting arrest, even though she conceded that Biyela had not done that.

Zondi said the issue of the photograph had played no meaningful role in the dispute, but she could not explain a recording on Biyela’s phone in which she was clearly heard to say: “Why are you taking my picture… She is continuing to take our pictures… What are you going to do? You will see you won’t do anything.”

She denied assaulting Biyela at the police station, saying the bruising – evident in pictures before the court – must have been a fabrication, self-inflicted or sustained elsewhere.

In his judgment, Davis said Biyela was an impressive witness who withstood cross-examination well.

He said she had waited a few days to lay the charge because she had wanted to discuss the issue with her seniors “and there is nothing sinister in this”.

Zondi’s version was too well-rehearsed, did not survive scrutiny, was at times farcical and “left a lot to be desired”, he said.

“On the conspectus of the evidence, the conclusion is that the incident was triggered when Biyela took a photograph of Zondi on her cellphone and this led to the arrest.”

He convicted Zondi of assault for kicking Biyela but acquitted her of another charge relating to the threat, saying it did not amount to an assault.

Metro police spokesman Sbonelo Mchunu said Zondi was still employed and had not told the police about the criminal case.

“But now that we know about it we will take appropriate action.”

The Mercury

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