A group of alleged rogue Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police Department (EMPD) officers under the command of suspended acting chief Brigadier Julius Mkhwanazi face a string of serious and violent crimes including murder.

The commission of inquiry into criminality, political interference and corruption in the criminal justice system chaired by retired Constitutional Court Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga on Friday heard how the three officers were protected and investigations into their conduct derailed.

Mkhwanazi’s boss, Jabulani Mapiyeye, whom he temporarily replaced after he was suspended in September last year for sexual harassment, told the commission that investigations were under way into serious cases, including murder allegedly committed by SWAT members, a unit headed by Mkhwanazi.

According to Mapiyeye, a murder case was opened in April 2022 after police recovered the body of a male at a dam in Nigel, where it had been dumped. He said the three officers were implicated.

Another case was reported in Hillbrow in 2023 when the officers gained access to a complainant’s property in Killarney, Johannesburg, under false pretences, claiming they were there to investigate lithium smuggling, and proceeded to rob the man of 54kg of semi-precious stones.

He testified that the officers stole sugilite stones, and he only became aware of the case in August 2023 when he received a letter of demand from the complainant’s attorney demanding payment of R45 million in damages from then minister of Police Bheki Cele and the EMPD.

The officers had claimed to be from the Hawks to gain access to the property. Mapiyeye said there are still pictures of the accused officers extracted from the house’s closed-circuit television footage.

“In these pictures, the members are clearly identifiable,” he explained. In another 2022 case, the officers were charged with theft, kidnapping, extortion, and defeating the ends of justice.

They raided the Smoke and King Supermarket and confiscated cigarettes worth R29,000, kidnapped the manager but tendered one box of cigarettes at the Benoni police station and claimed they found it abandoned.

Mapiyeye said one resigned but the two others are back in the system despite having been dismissed.

In 2022, the same officers involved in the Benoni case robbed the premises of another complainant in Meyerton in the Vaal, and the matter is registered as “copper theft”. Mapiyeye did not provide further details of the case.

He added that in 2023, they also stole from a truck in Putfontein, Benoni, under false pretences.

Two of the three officers hijacked a truck on the N12 highway and proceeded to steal its load.

Mapiyeye said Mkhwanazi retained the officers, who are part of his specialised services unit, in his team notwithstanding the several cases against them.

He said disciplinary hearings against the officers were continuously being frustrated internally and were later reassigned to their positions and their service pistols restored.

loyiso.sidimba@inl.co.za

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