A multidisciplinary SA Police Service (SAPS) task team swooped on several premises where they rescued a businessman, recovered luxury vehicles, and arrested six suspects allegedly connected to a kidnapping syndicate on Thursday.
SAPS spokesperson Brigadier Athlenda Mathe said the arrests had come after the team, comprising the SAPS Special Task Force (STF), police crime intelligence, and organised crime officers, had been conducting surveillance operations on the syndicate, which had been kidnapping business owners in Gauteng.
Mathe said police had already connected the suspects to more than 16 kidnapping cases where ransom demands had been made in Gauteng.
“In a takedown operation on Thursday morning, the team, led by the Special Task Force and hostage negotiators, conducted operations at various identified addresses in Gauteng including Jeppe, Helderwyk, Brackenhurst and Daveyton. A businessman who was kidnapped on 07 January 2023 was successfully rescued from one of the premises and reunited with his family,” Mathe said.
Police seized five high-performance powered vehicles, including two BMWs, two Mercedes Benz sedans, and one Toyota Urban Cruiser. The team also recovered 20 cell phones and 30 portable GPS tracking devices.
SAPS National Commissioner General Fannie Masemola commended the team for the arrests. He said police were infiltrating and apprehending the syndicates who were responsible for the spate of kidnappings in the country.
“Our message is clear: the SAPS is coming for all criminals; either they make our lives easy by handing themselves in, or we fetch them ourselves,” Masemola said.
In an unrelated incident, Sandton police arrested a Tanzanian national on Wednesday afternoon for possession and dealing in drugs. Police were acting on intelligence-driven information when they found the suspect in possession of 500g of crystal meth and 1kg of heroin at an upmarket hotel in Sandton.
