Community Safety MEC Dan Plato says he receives complaints from residents daily about people being assaulted by police during raids.
|||Cape Town - Community Safety MEC Dan Plato says he receives complaints from residents “on a day-to-day basis” about being assaulted by police during raids.
Plato was speaking following a Cape Argus report on Monday which stated that Steenberg police were being investigated for a string of allegations, including officers using baseball bats and hockey sticks to beat suspects.
Eleven residents have since filed complaints with the Independent Police Investigative Directorate, and also a request to have police interdicted from unlawfully assaulting members of the public.
Plato said on Monday he had received complaints of police kicking doors in, tossing furniture around and assaulting residents.
“It is not part of the SAPS’s job to break down people’s property left, right and centre,” he said, adding: ““It is not part of their jobs to attack people, regardless of whether they are drug lords or not.”
Residents in a small cul de sac in Capricorn Park, near Steenberg, said on Monday that police harassed them on a weekly basis.
Sylvester Tanga, 19, showed the Cape Argus a black mark below his eye which he said he got during a raid a few weeks ago: “They say we sell drugs but we don’t. My dog was killed a few weeks ago because his barking annoyed them.”
Another resident, Norman Fortune, 41, said he felt police targeted him because of his gold chains. “Young kids (police officers) want to smack me because they say I am a gangster, but I fix cellphones.”
Cynthia Katasie, 40, shares a home with Tommy Newman, 53, and they said they had fixed their door three times after police kicked it in during raids.
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Cape Argus