Dear Editor
The South African Police Service (SAPS) must be transparent about the real conviction rate for illegal firearm cases — not from the point of prosecution, but from the point of arrest.
The City of Cape Town’s clamp down on gun crime over four years, shows that 1 670 illegal firearms were seized by its officers, arrests were made and these matters were handed over to the national SAPS for investigation and prosecution, but only 5% of these led to guilty verdicts in Court.
The DA in Parliament will move for SAPS to appear before the Police Portfolio Committee to explain this dismal gun crime conviction rate of just 5% in Cape Town.
SAPS’s recent claim of an “80–90% conviction rate” is untrue, because it is only measuring convictions against prosecutions, not against arrests. The SAPS is deliberately not comparing the number of convictions to the number of arrests, when they present their version, because the cases show that clearly the SAPS is dropping the ball.
Nearly half of the cases (49%) didn’t even make it to court due to incomplete investigations by the SAPS, missing forensic evidence, or defective dockets rejected by prosecutors.
While the City of Cape Town’s Metro Police officers and Safety & Security services in general play a vital role in plugging the gaps left by the national SAPS in the City of Cape Town, their arrests for illegal gun crimes are being undermined by SAPS and prosecution failures further down the criminal justice chain, and by the limitation on the legal powers of the City’s Metro Police to investigate crime.
SAPS detectives work under enormous burden to build cases, and are then hampered by systemic failures — including chronic delays in ballistic analysis and a severe communication gap between investigators and prosecutors. As a result, cases fall through the cracks, dockets stall, and justice is delayed or denied.
The City of Cape Town has shown what is possible to plug the gaps in law enforcement left by failures of the SAPS, but it cannot itself finalize criminal investigations or undertake prosecutions – and for that it relies on the National Government’s policing and prosecution services.
What is required is transparency and honesty from the SAPS and a great deal of cooperation. A Metro like the City of Cape Town which proves itself capable of intervening in gun crime must be fully and properly supported by the SAPS to see arrests become prosecutions and convictions.
All spheres of government have a role to play. With honest engagement, shared accountability, and a commitment to fixing the system, we can ensure that criminals face real consequences and communities see real change.
The victims of gun violence deserve better — together.
Regards
Ian Cameron MP
DA Spokesperson on Police