PRETORIA – The National Commissioner of the South African Police Service (SAPS), General Fannie Masemola has commended a multidisciplinary team for the arrest of six men believed to be part of a syndicate that has been terrorising business owners in Gauteng.
The team consisting of various units led by Crime Intelligence Officers, and Organised Crime members has been conducting surveillance on the syndicate and has already linked them to more than 16 cases of kidnappings where ransom demands were being made in the Gauteng province.
In a takedown operation on Thursday morning, the team led by the Special Task Force (STF) 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.
At these premises, police also seized five high-performance powered vehicles including two BMWs, two Mercedes Benz sedans, and one Toyota Urban Cruiser.
Twenty cell phones and thirty portable GPS tracking devices are also among the items seized by the team.
The National Commissioner of the SAPS, General Fannie Masemola says police continue to infiltrate and apprehend those behind 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”.
In another unrelated incident, Sandton police arrested a Tanzanian national for possession and dealing in drugs on Wednesday afternoon. Police were acting on intelligence-driven information when they found the suspect in possession of 500g of crystal meth and 1 kg of heroin at an upmarket hotel in Sandton.
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