Cape Town – Suspects who were arrested following a deadly shootout in Rosettenville, Johannesburg on Monday, have reportedly claimed that their illegal activities were motivated by poverty.
The eight suspects were arrested after police acted on a tip-off and deployed a helicopter to fend off a planned cash-in-transit robbery in Rosettenville.
The suspects fired at the police chopper and wounded one of the pilots, forcing police to shoot back.
“They shot the helicopter before anybody did anything to them,” Police Minister Bheki Cele told reporters at the scene of the crime. “They shot the pilot.”
The minister said a gang of about 25 gunmen from the southeastern KwaZulu-Natal province as well as from neighbouring Zimbabwe and Botswana were involved in the attempted robbery.
“We are working with heartless people that are prepared to kill. One of the suspects said they were doing this because of poverty,” EWN quoted Cele as saying.
There has been an apparent surge in cash-in-transit crimes in recent weeks.
Last week, 13 people, including a South African SA National Defence Force (SANDF) member and a police officer, were arrested in connection with a foiled robbery in Carletonville on the West Rand of Gauteng.
Following the incident, SBV Services, a cash-in-transit company that has been widely targeted by the armed gangs, expressed concern about the level of violence used when the gangs targeted its cash-in-transit vehicles.
“Looking at attacks across the year compared with the previous two years, the number of attacks overall has remained relatively constant. Attacks on G4S have also not varied materially from year to year,” News24 quoted G4S South Africa MD Renso Smit as saying.
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Additional reporting by AFP
