Last year, according to the Minister of Law and Order, police killed 400 people and wounded 623. In a small number of cases in which police have been charged for killings or assaults, the court proceedings have thrown light on the daily activities of the police in suppressing resistance. Inquests and lawsuits brought against the police by members of the public – there were 171 such cases last year – also reveal details of police violence.
- Zwelocingo Mbasane, a municipal policeman from Gompo (formerly Duncan Village), East London, was sentenced in February to an effective two and a half years' imprisonment for attempted murder. He had opened fire on a man walking down the street, shooting him in the back. The magistrate noted that it was the third time 'within a short period' that the East London court had tried a Gompo municipal policeman for the illegal use of a firearm.
- Another Gompo municipal policeman, Mzimasi Makhubalo, was sentenced in March to a R800 fine or a year in jail for shooting a young woman in her home. The incident, which took place at the height of popular protests in the area, occurred when he broke into the woman's house, apparently to investigate a murder.
- Gavin Dhanda, a policeman attached to the Soweto Unrest Unit, was fined R800 (or six months' imprisonment) in March for killing a ten-year-old boy, Xolani LUCAS, in 1985. Lucas had allegedly been amongst a group of children and youths throwing stones, but the police admitted that it had not been 'necessary' to open fire on the boy.
- In May a member of the Security Branch, Eric Maluleka, appeared in the Durban Supreme Court on a charge of murder. Witnesses said that he had chased a man, shot him in the back and then fired another three shots into him after he had fallen to the ground.
- During the trial of three policemen from Impendle in Natal in May, witnesses described how the three had hired a man to assassinate a woman who had laid charges of assault against them. Wearing overalls and a balaclava, the assassin had shot the woman with a gun provided by the policemen, in return for a promised reward of R5,000.
- Special Constable Joseph Gomo from Aberdeen in the Eastern Cape was jailed for six months in April for violating a court order restraining him and eleven of his colleagues from assaulting residents. Gomo attacked two people in their homes, hitting them with his rifle.
- In April Captain Jack la Grange and Detective Sergeant Robert van der Merwe were sentenced to death for the murder of two men, and the attempted murder of a third, in a widely-publicised trial in Johannesburg. La Grange asked van der Merwe to carry out the first killing to eliminate a drugs dealer competing with another dealer who was a friend of la Grange – the subsequent killing and attempted murder were to cover this up. Van der Merwe was told that his targets were ANC members, and willingly complied. His defence counsel said that he had been involved in countering popular resistance for ten years, lived in a 'sub-culture of violence', and would have been 'awarded a medal' if he had carried out the killings in Botswana or another neighbouring country.
In the Cape Town Supreme Court an action by the Methodist Church and 21 families for R312,000 damages against the Minister of Law and Order continued to provide evidence of police involvement in the destruction of the KTC squatter settlement in June 1986. Sixty thousand people were made homeless when gangs of 'Witdoeke' vigilantes, supported by police, destroyed the settlement.
Craig Matthew, a television cameraman, told the court that he had filmed Witdoeke methodically burning homes while police patrolled alongside them in Casspir armoured vehicles. He and his crew had then been arrested and their film destroyed. Film belonging to another cameraman, George De'Ath, who was killed by the Witdoeke, had also been tampered with. Another television reporter, Bjorn Rudner, said that during a 20-minute battle between KTC residents and Witdoeke, police had fired shotguns and teargas only at the residents.
Iris Dyantyi, a KTC resident, told the court that she had seen armed Witdoeke emerging from a police Casspir. Lee Bozalek, an attorney, said he had been prevented from going into KTC by a police and army roadblock, but about 100 armed Witdoeke had streamed past the soldiers and police, who made no attempt to stop them.
Getyamaha Mselanto, a former vigilante, told the court that he and hundreds of other Witdoeke had been told by their leader that they should go into KTC and burn houses, and that the police would not stop them. A video film shown in the court pictured a vigilante leader saying over a police public address system that Witdoeke 'were needed at KTC'. A police van and a Casspir were in the background. In another scene, after the attack, Witdoeke were shown massing near a police van, and a voice, which was identified in court as that of a white man, was heard saying 'You have done your job, well done! Go home... Go, you have done your duty.'
Requests for access to police records and minutes of the local Joint Management Centre, which co-ordinates 'security' action, were refused by the Minister of Law and Order and his deputy, who invoked the Internal Security Act to deny the court access to the documents.
On 20 June an inquest opened in Pretoria into the deaths of at least 12 people shot by police during protests in Mamelodi on 21 November 1985. The shootings took place after thousands of residents marched to the local town council chambers to protest at high rents and the activities of police and soldiers in the township.
The police officer in charge, Brigadier Hertzog Lerm, told the court that at the time Mamelodi and other Pretoria townships were 'under the total control of the comrades', mainly young militants. 'People reported cases to the comrades, they held courts; rent, water and electricity were no longer being paid, schools were no longer being attended', he said.
Police witnesses admitted that the marchers, who were led by women, were unarmed and had not been throwing stones or showing signs of aggression, although they were chanting and singing and displaying placards. The crowd had refused to disperse, an action which one police officer claimed was an 'essential sign of aggression'. However, earlier that morning, crowds had thrown stones at a police station and police residences and a police colonel was reported as saying to Brigadier Lerm: 'We must kill thousands of people if we have to stop the mob.'
Police fired teargas at the crowd and then opened fire, killing at least 12 people, including pensioners. The injured were reported to have filled two wards of the local hospital. Evelyn Mthimunye, one of the injured residents, told the court that she was on her way to her aunt's house when she had seen a group of youths running away from an army vehicle. A soldier had pointed a shotgun at her and fired, injuring her in the buttocks.
