Another City cop shot
A POLICE officer who was shot in the mouth in front of his 4-year-old granddaughter in Mitchells Plain yesterday became the eighth police officer to be shot in the space of 11 days in South Africa.
The little girl burst out crying as she watched her grandfather, Herman Prins, 50, fall to the ground.
Seven officers have been killed countrywide during the last 11 days. The seventh officer to be killed was shot dead at the Orange Farm train station in Gauteng by unknown gunmen yesterday, and his colleague was critically injured.
A total of 55 police officers have been killed since the beginning of the year. This includes SAPS members and the metro police.
Warrant Officer Prins – who is part of the Crime Prevention Unit at Mitchells Plain police station – was shot once through the cheek at a car wash yesterday.
Last night he was in a stable condition in hospital, with the bullet still lodged in his mouth.
Acting provincial police commissioner Thembisile Patekile condemned the shooting yesterday, saying police were “saddened by these senseless shootings”.
Prins had been off duty and had fetched his granddaughter from crèche earlier.
The two were enjoying a cold drink when the incident occurred.
Witness Berenice Mitus, 33, said she saw a group of men approach Prins, and then heard one gunshot.
“He (Prins) fell to the ground. There was lots of blood, and the poor little girl, she just started crying. I’m still shaking,” Mitus said.
Police spokesperson Tembinkosi Kinana said: “An offduty Mitchells Plain police officer was shot and injured in the face by unidentified suspects, who later fled the scene.
“According to the information, the victim was standing at the car wash in a garage situated at the corner of The Cedars Avenue and Boshof Street, Westridge, when one of the suspects went past and shot at him.
The officer was immediately rushed to a nearby hospital for medical examination,” he said.
Kinana said police were investigating an attempted murder case and that no arrests had been made.
Last week, Warrant Officer Petrus Holz was killed by knifewielding assailants when he stopped to fix punctures along the N2 “Hell Run” after he drove over debris in the road.
Holz’s funeral will be held at the Dutch Reformed Church in Somerset West at 11am today.
Police are also investigating another case of attempted murder after an officer was wounded when a gunman opened fire in Delft in the early hours of Sunday.
President Jacob Zuma this week condemned the killings and said the public should work with law enforcement agencies in the fight against crime. Patekile echoed Zuma’s plea yesterday, urging communities to mobilise to help make sure police officers were safe. “Prins was off-duty, so these guys must have recognised him because he was very commit- ted and involved with policing in the area,” he said.
“He was part of the community, so it’s very sad and surprising that this would happen to him in his own neighbour- hood. It’s a huge concern that there have been more than three incidents where police officers have been targeted in shootings within a week.
“This weekend we also saw stones being thrown at police. It is unacceptable; tomorrow (Friday) we are burying another one of our own.
“It is a big concern, and I must appeal to the community to change their mindset and how they view police, to help protect our police officers.”
Prins’s relative, John Pascoe, said the family was still very “traumatised but coping”.
Pascoe said Prins and his older brother Tobias – who is also a police officer – were both very active in crime prevention and policing in Mitchells Plain.