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- The NPA has dropped the criminal prosecution of former Hawks general Jan Mabula and seven other officers.
- The police informant, Solomon Nengwane, died in their custody in 2006, with allegations that he had been tortured to death.
- The new decision contravenes an instruction from the Directorate of Investigations that they will be tried.
Controversial former Hawks general Jan Mabula, accused along with seven other officers of torturing a police informant to death in 2006, will not be criminally prosecuted.
READ | ‘Torture’ cops: NPA stonewall court action, 14 years later
Instead, a masterful investigation will be conducted to prove whether the actions of Mabula and his gang led to the death of Solomon Nengwane.
This week, the director of the NPA Public Prosecutor’s Office in Pretoria, defender Sibongile Mzinyathi, refused to prosecute the officers for lack of evidence.
The new leadership on this matter stands in stark contrast to the recommendations of the head of the Directorate of Investigations, Hermione Cronje, in January, who called for the officers to be brought to justice. In an official NPA statement on Wednesday obtained by News24, Mzinyathi indicated that a criminal trial would likely “fall apart.”
“I refuse to prosecute at this stage. A magistrate has been requested to carry out a formal investigation,” he wrote.
“The senior prosecutor or an experienced regional court prosecutor should thoroughly cross-examine the witnesses … and ensure that the specific issues addressed in their statements are thoroughly analyzed.”
Once the investigation is complete, he added, the prosecutor must submit a report on the “prospects for a successful prosecution.”
Nengwane, a police informant, had been located by a task force assembled to investigate a high-profile robbery: the theft of 14 million rand from the evidence locker at Benoni Police Station in May 2006.
The team, led by Mabula, is accused of beating Nengwane to death and then embarking on a savage cover-up, claiming that Nengwane had died of an asthma attack while in their custody.
Mabula is viewed as an executor and has played a role in several politically tainted arrests, including that of former KZN Hawks director Johan Booysen and forensic investigator Paul O’Sullivan. He has close ties with the deputy head of the National Tax Authority, Nomgcobo Jiba, and the former head of the Criminal Intelligence Unit, Richard Mdluli.
Following an exhaustive investigation by the Independent Police Investigations Directorate (IPID), the top brass of the National Tax Authority ordered Mabula and his crew criminally charged in January.
“Although this matter is very serious and deserves prosecution, the nature of the charges does not fall within the scope of identification … so it is returned for prosecution,” he said.
The ID had prepared a draft indictment, which drew the veil on a team of allegedly dishonest police officers, led by Mabula.
“Nengwane was arrested by the task force and taken to the Mmakau Police Station in Northwest Province, where he was interrogated and assaulted. He was suffocated and died,” the document read.
“Mabula arranged for team members to drop Nengwane off at Dr. George Mukhari Hospital in Ga-Rankuwa for medical attention, claiming that he experienced respiratory problems or an asthma attack.”
This was the gist of the cover-up, Cronje said, insisting that Mabula and his team had aligned their stories in official police statements. But all this, it is claimed, was lies. Mzinyathi took a different view.
In a letter accompanying the decision to decline prosecution, addressed to IPID Principal Investigator Anthony Sehas, Mzinyathi exposes the shortcomings of the case.
“The dead people [Nengwane] clearly he died while in police custody. However, there is no objective evidence other than statements from the suspects about what happened to him and who may have killed or injured him. “
“The cause of death from oxygen deficiency cannot be determined with certainty. Two pathologists found this to be the case. The deceased had two superficial injuries on the upper lip and bridge of the nose and abrasions on the wrists consistent with handcuffs. No investigation was conducted to find out what, in addition to the tube torture, may have caused the superficial injuries to the deceased, ”he wrote.
The officers had left Nengwane’s body at George Mukhari Hospital in the northwest, four hours after he was taken from his home in handcuffs.
The police informant, Solomon Nengwane, died in custody in 2006.
Police claim that Nengwane developed breathing difficulties while only minutes away from the facility, but a doctor who examined him found that rigor mortis had already set in, impossible just minutes after death.
“The state would seek to rely on the statements made by the suspects after the death of the deceased as circumstantial evidence combined with the opinion expressed by the doctor to ask the court to infer that the suspects are responsible for the death,” Mzinyathi added.
“If the statements are declared inadmissible, the whole case will collapse. Even if they are admitted, the unfinished cause of death, the gap in the chain of custody and the absence of injuries will leave the court with doubts about what happened to the deceased. “
“There is no objective evidence of who was responsible for the death, when the injuries were inflicted and how it was done. There is strong suspicion without evidence,” Mzinyathi said.
The lawyer acting on behalf of Mabula and all seven said the state had no evidence to rely on.
“It is clear that, as the case file stands at this time, there is no evidence on which the State can base a case against our clients,” they said in a letter to News24.
“Depending on the outcome of the investigation, our clients may not be prosecuted at all.”
READ MORE | Kidnapping, Beating and Torture: Prosecution of Ex-Hawks General Positions
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