‘26s gang may kill me if you send
SA’S gangsterism problem has cropped up globally with an unusual asylum case in Britain. By
The far-reaching implications of South Africa’s gangsterism epidemic are becoming apparent with a convict in the UK trying to claim asylum there, saying if he is sent back to this country, from where he is originally, gangsters may kill him.
The man has also told authorities there that a friend of his, a gangster who warned him about being targeted, was subsequently murdered.
These allegations have emerged in the UK as major organised crime cases are developing in South Africa’s gangsterism capital, the Western Cape, which has recently experienced a surge in shootings.
Through the Western Cape court cases, more details are being revealed about the operations of the notorious number gangs – the 27s and 28s.
The UK asylum matter, meanwhile, references another number gang, the 26s.
The number
Based on testimony from a former policeman, Jeremy Vearey, it previously emerged in a case in the High Court in Cape Town that the 26s gang represented the “economic” or “business” sector of the number gangs and was tasked with getting hold of money.
The 27s gang members were soldiers or “men of blood” who “wage war” and conducted killings in ways that involved lots of blood.
And the members of the 28s, according to Vearey’s testimony, were “a paramilitary structure” and the “political authority” or “parliament” of the number gangs.
The matter playing out in the UK relates to the 26s and outstanding drug money, which
ties in with what the gang is known for in South Africa – getting hold of cash.
A decision from the UK’S Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber, which allows for a man, originally from South Africa, to have an appeal about a human rights and protection claim matter reheard, provides insight into the case.
The document, issued on 25 March, outlines his background and says he was convicted of various drug- and violencerelated charges in the UK between 2017 and 2020.
‘Friend shot dead’
The man – the appellant – was granted anonymity in the case and he therefore may not be named.
He was previously found to have been vague and “not reliable” about being threatened. But because his case is set to continue, it will probably include his assertions and situation being looked at again.
A section of the UK asylum chamber decision document says: “The appel- lant claims that he will be at risk on return [to his home country] from a gang known as the 26s which operates in South Africa.
“He says this is because he owes money to that gang for drugs he held for them.
“A friend who was a member of the gang warned the appellant that he would be shot and killed by the gang if he returned. Since that warning, that friend has been shot dead.”
No further details were provided about that incident.
A previous finding against the man was that his insistence that the 26s gang threatened him was “based largely on hearsay, from a claimed friend in South Africa and you have failed to provide any specific or conclusive evidence that you would be threatened or harmed on return to South Africa”. More evidence may be used in his matter as it continues.
The decision document, enabling his appeal in the matter to be reheard, details how he arrived in the UK and ended up facing deportation.
Violence and drugs
It said he was a South African national who moved to the UK in 2005 with his father and brother to join his mother.
The following year, he was granted “indefinite leave to remain” (otherwise known as long residency) in the UK, which the rest of his family had. He was educated in the UK from the age of nine and subsequently worked in that country.
Based on the decision document, the man had visited South Africa and claimed to have had “meetings with members of the 26s gang”. It was not clear when that was.
In April 2020 he was sentenced to two years and two months in jail in the UK for a grievous bodily harm case. Deportation processes against him started after this.
A few months later, in September 2020, he was sentenced to another year in jail for possessing drugs and intending to supply them elsewhere.
... being a member of a “particular social group”
could prove one was “unable to go back [to a home country] because you have a well-founded
fear of persecution”
Asylum
The man claimed not to have heard from the 26s gang since the start of 2020, which was the year of his being sentenced to jail time.
He was served a signed deportation notice in November 2021 and tried claiming asylum in February 2022.
According to a UK government website, to be recognised there as a refugee under a United Nations convention, being a member of a “particular social group” could prove one was “unable to go back [to a home country] because you have a well-founded fear of persecution”.
In the case of the man in the UK, he claimed “that he is a member of the particular social group, namely, a person who faces being killed by the 26s gang in South Africa as its members regard him as owing them money”.
A judge previously found, though, that he was not a member of a “particular social group”.
These issues and findings may change when the man’s case is reheard.
Deadly gun attacks
The veracity of his allegations aside, they still point to the notoriety associated with, and extensive reach of, organised crime in South Africa.
Recently, violence in the Western Cape specifically, where many gangs operate, has
surged, with several shootings reported.
This week in Nyanga, four people were shot in one incident.
The week before that, a few kilometres away in Khayelitsha, eight people were killed in three shooting incidents.
Meanwhile, emphasising that the police and prosecutors are trying to hit back at the scourge of criminality, are at least three key court cases developing in the Western Cape.
The cases hint at how organised crime circles, involving the number gangs, overlap and how incidents in South Africa link to other countries.
The matter playing out in the UK relates to the 26s and outstanding drug money, which therefore ties in with what the gang is known for in South Africa – getting hold of cash
Political authority:
Expanding criminal accusations
One case, which has several offshoots, is focused on alleged 28s gang boss Ralph Stanfield and his wife Nicole Johnson. Johnson and Stanfield have been behind bars since their arrests in the upmarket Cape Town suburb of Constantia in September last year in a case related to car theft.
Stanfield also faces an attempted murder charge.
Other issues surrounding the couple are developing in different directions.
Aside from the car theft case they are accused in, they are also charged in another matter stemming from 2014 and involving allegations that police officers fraudulently created firearm licences for them and associates.
Last month, the government blacklisted a company Johnson runs that was also previously involved in building houses for the City of Cape Town, which last year blacklisted several companies linked to her.
More arrests linked to Stanfield and Johnson have also been carried out recently.
Last week, Johnson’s mother Barbara was among three suspects detained in the expanding case.
The three appeared in a Bellville court and were released on bail with Stanfield’s brother Kyle, who was arrested about two weeks ago on a charge of defeating the ends of justice.
Two trials
Stanfield’s name has cropped up in a big Western Cape trial that has an international angle.
According to the State, Stanfield was an associate of Brian Wainstein, a globally connected steroid smuggler who was assassinated in August 2017 in his home in Constantia, the same suburb in which Stanfield and Johnson were arrested last year.
Wainstein, also known as the “Steroid King”, had operated via countries including Ireland and the US.
Among those on trial in the High Court in Cape Town for his murder are Mark Lifman and Jerome “Donkie” Booysen, both of whom recently pleaded not guilty. Their names have also cropped up in accusations about dodgy nightclub security operations.
The 27s gang fits into the Wainstein trial as allegations, surfacing through witness testimony, include that its members assisted in his assassination.
Back in 2021, before the Wainstein trial started, William “Red” Stevens, who was also an accused and widely reputed to have been the most senior 27s gangster in the Western Cape, was also murdered.
A second major trial playing out in the High Court in Cape Town is involves a group including Nafiz Modack, an alleged rival of Lifman and Booysen.
This group is accused in connection with crimes including the September 2020 assassination of policeman Charl Kinnear.
Kinnear was murdered outside his home in the Cape Town suburb of Bishop Lavis, parts of which are well known as strongholds of the 28s gang.
Evidence and accusations that surface in the two trials, plus the Stanfield-related cases, will probably show how various individuals may be connected.
SA, apartheid and ‘torture’
Although gangsterism is indeed a massive problem in South Africa, other individuals also facing deportation back to this country have previously offered some unusual reasons to try to stop that from happening.
One such case involves Chantelle Robbertse, who in 2019 was sentenced to two years in jail in the US over a fraud scheme.
She was 24 at the time and subsequently, trying to prevent deportation, she tried seeking relief under the Convention Against Torture, which effectively requires a state not to expel someone to another country where they may be tortured.
According to court papers from Robbertse’s matter dated August last year, she “asserted that she would be persecuted or tortured in South Africa because she is white, her father had been a high-ranking member of military intelligence prior to 1998, and her family had otherwise been targeted by opponents of apartheid”.
However, not surprisingly, the US court found that “Robbertse’s arguments and evidence regarding country conditions and the likelihood of torture fall well short” of meeting the requirements for the relief she was seeking.