Robbers have change of heart

ARMED robbers apologised to a Newlands West mother of three when they realised she was a black African.

“Sorry sisi. We thought only Indians lived here,” one of the three men told former teacher Rose Gopichand (née Masuku) last Tuesday.

Gopichand, a 35-year-old Earlsfield resident, is married to Sunil, 48, a South African of Indian origin. He works at the eThekwini Municipality.

Gopichand said the comment about race had left her speechless.

She believed the robbers arrived at their home last Tuesday night with the intention of robbing and possibly killing them but changed their minds when they realised she was not Indian.

She has two children, a 10-year-old son and a daughter, 7, from a previous relationship, and a 17-month-old son with Sunil, her husband of four years.

She said after supper, the family was chatting while the television was on.

“I heard the dogs barking at the gate, but I did not think much of it until the group kicked down the front door. We screamed in panic. They told us to lie down and not look at them. They covered my face with a bedsheet and pointed guns to my husband and older son’s heads. They asked for cash and gold and we told them we did not have any.”

Gopichand said the mood suddenly changed and the attackers began apologising for breaking into her home.

“They told me, ‘Sorry sisi. We thought only Indians lived here. We didn’t know black people were in the house’.”

According to Gopichand, the men argued among themselves about whether or not to take the family car, a BMW, which was parked in the yard. Eventually, they decided against it.

She said throughout their ordeal, she recited Psalm 23 from the Bible, The Lord is my Shepherd.

The robbers left after contacting an e-hailing service to fetch them. They took the TV set and a DStv decoder.

Gopichand believed the group had monitored their movements and had initially thought she was the domestic worker.

Since the incident, her family is fearful of another attack and struggle to sleep.

“It is by the grace of God that no harm came to us. My daughter and I could have been raped and my sons and husband could have been killed.”

Sunil returned to work this week.

Police spokesperson Captain Nqobile Gwala said a case of house robbery was opened at the Newlands East police station.

“The complainant alleged that on October 1 at 8pm he was at his place of residence with his family when he heard noise and went to investigate. He was confronted by three armed men who robbed them of a TV and DStv decoder. They fled the scene on foot.”

According to the Victims of Crime report, released by Statistics South Africa last week, there were 1.3 million house robberies between April 2018 and March 2019.

The survey was carried out by the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) who said the results indicated South Africans were no longer safe in their homes.

The survey also pointed out that there was an increase in crimes in which weapons like knives or guns were used. This, said the CSVR, was likely to worsen the victims’ trauma.

According to a press statement released by Statistics SA: “The most likely victims of housebreaking were male-headed households, households in metros, Indian/Asian households followed by White households, very low and very high-income households, households in the Northern Cape, Gauteng and KZN.”

Andrew Faull, a senior researcher in the Justice and Violence Prevention Programme for the Institute for Security Studies, said the targeting of Indian and white households had to do with wealth.

“It has to do with affluence in society and who people perceive to be more affluent. Men are seen as more affluent than women and white and Indians are seen more affluent to black and coloured.”

In July, an armed gang in Johannesburg also apologised to radio and TV personality Masechaba Ndlovu after recognising who she was.

The gang allegedly stormed into her Bryanston home, and pulled her out of bed at gunpoint. During an interview on SAfm, she said one of the robbers apologised because they were under the impression that white people lived in the home.

Her son, 11, was sleeping next to her and her other son, 6, was with his nanny in another bedroom. They took her BMW, cellphones, TV, laptop and cash.