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'Name the crime, we've had it'
18/10/2007 22:19 - (SA)
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| Lynnwood Manor residents have put 45 gallon drums in all roads leading into their neighbourhood. (Leon Botha, Beeld) |
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Verashni Pillay
Pretoria - Lynwood Manor residents took the law into their own hands after a spate of violent crimes, by erecting their own barriers to streets going in and out of the neighbourhood.
News24 on Thursday learnt that the residents would also be taking Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality to court.
"The mood is tense," said Lynwood Manor resident, Dr Kevin Gast. "When you have toddlers shot and woman raped and tortured the mood is very tense."
Metro Police tried to stop the residents after they erected barriers made from tin drums, to control traffic coming into the streets.
"We've applied to the municipality for some form of assistance more than ten years ago," said Gast. "We adhered to the letter to every rule in the book with no response whatsoever."
Good relationship with cops
While Gast said they had a good relationship with the police and the Metro Police, the community had had enough after two murders, one attempted murder and one armed robbery incident - all within 5 days, according to a report in Beeld.
"We've had so many murders, robberies, attempted murders in our area in the last few months that it's actually quite appalling," said Gast.
"I mean we've had toddlers shot, we've had old people mutilated with crow bars, we've had people murdered, we've had break-ins... You name it we've had it."
Gast said the drum barriers, manned by private security guards, were there to prevent further bloodshed.
Gast himself had been a victim of crime five times in three years, in one incident even being a victim of an armed hostage situation.
About 70 residents, out of 110, were part of a resident association that paid for the guards at the barricaded streets.
Tensions escalated in Lynwood Manor after Kathy Odendaal, 51, was assaulted, robbed, raped and shot dead in her home on Tuesday afternoon, just a few houses away from where a three-year-old girl was shot in the back in a robbery on Saturday night.
News24 was unable to get a comment from Metro Police on Thursday afternoon.
The residents have applied for an urgent application to have the court sanction their application to have their area legally blocked off.
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