'Long arm of law needs muscle'

2004-12-08 23:27

Jorisna Bonthuys and Pieter du Toit

Cape Town - The long arm of the law is still not long enough to curb crime.

Parliament heard on Wednesday that less than one-third of all cases reported to the South African Police Services (SAPS) ended in criminal prosecutions.

Only 27% of cases investigated by police resulted in suspects being prosecuted.

This information was revealed by the Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula in answer to a question put to him by Democratic Alliance MP Roy Jankielsohn.

Jankielsohn said the lack of resources clearly had an effect on the police success rate and it was also probably the reason for investigating officers having such heavy workloads.

Investigating officers have 100 cases each, on average.

Anton du Plessis, an Institute for Security Studies (ISS) director, said South Africa's prosecution tempo compared well to that of other countries.

Court findings also telling

He said these figures were determined by three factors: charges referred to court; charges laid, but withdrawn by police; and charges laid, but later dropped by complainants.

He said the figure of 27% was "not too bad" for South Africa.

He said the prosection tempo in England and Wales, which was measured in the same way, stood at 23%.

"This does not mean, however, there are no problems."

Du Plessis said court findings also needed to be taken into account.

"The High Court figure stands at 87%, regional courts, where most cases are heard, stands at 70% and district courts are at 86%. This is not so bad."

But, on further inspection, South Africa's statistics on guilty findings in murder and rape charges are a lot lower than countries such as America.

However, assaults amount to 11% in South Africa, as opposed to 8% in America.

According to an ISS study, published in SA Crime Quarterly recently, only three-quarters of violent crimes reported ended up in court.

- Die Burger