Patrolling police officers chanced upon a gruesome and puzzling scene in the early hours of this morning (Wednesday 12 November).
Lentegeur police spokesperson Const Navon van Houten said officers investigated a grey Volkswagen Polo parked on the corner of Park Road and Hillcrest Street in Montclare at 06:00 this morning.
“When the members inspected the vehicle they saw occupants inside without any signs of life,” he said.
Officers called for an ambulance and paramedics declared the three occupants, two men and a woman, dead on arrival.
The victims had multiple gunshot wounds, but no casings were found on the scene, Van Houten said. Residents, however, reported hearing shots when police questioned them.
Shot elsewhere
Van Houten said police suspect the victims were shot elsewhere and then driven to that spot and the car was abandoned there.
Lentegeur Community Policing Forum chair Michael Jacobs said: “We call on the South African Police Service and the relevant authorities to look thoroughly at the circumstances surrounding the three ending up being found dead in a car.”
He confirmed police’s suspicion that the murders had occurred elsewhere.
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“We as a community cannot allow gun violence to continue unabated in our communities,” he said, also calling for “constant roadblocks” and stop-and-searches. “We ask the police services to step their patrols up as well as their search capacity.
“We are calling on all authorities in law enforcement to get to the bottom of this triple killing and we cannot allow that there are no consequences for gun violence, not only in Lentegeur and Mitchell’s Plain but on the whole of the Cape Flats.”
Gang-related?
Van Houten added that police do not think the shootings are gang-related.
The police’s provincial media centre issued a statement saying that the victims were all young people in their early twenties and that an intensive investigation has been launched, but claimed that the shooting was suspected to be gang-related.
Provincial Commissioner of the Western Cape Lt-Gen (Adv) Thembisile Patekile, in a statement, expressed strong condemnation of the senseless act of violence and reiterated the police’s unwavering commitment to dismantling gangs and rooting those who continue to terrorise communities out.
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“Gangsterism has no place in our society,” he said. “The South African Police Service will continue to exert pressure on these criminal networks until every individual involved in violent crimes is brought to justice.”
Members of the public are urged to assist police by sharing any information that could aid the investigation. Information can be shared anonymously via Crime Stop on 08600 10111 or through the MySAPS mobile application.
