Booze in boot hijack clue
Possible links between weekend hijackings, robberies and hostage drama
POSSIBLE links are being investigated between a string of violent hijackings, robberies and hostage dramas which left a bloody trail of death and injury between Plettenberg Bay and Port Elizabeth at the weekend. Alcohol found in the boot of a car hijacked in Plett on Saturday has led police to believe the hijackers were involved in a violent liquor store robbery and hostage drama that could also have links to a deadly crime spree – including two other hijackings – which started in the resort town and ended in Port Elizabeth on Sunday.
William Marshall, 26, of Thornhill, was shot after trying to wrestle a firearm from one of the hijackers in Thornhill on Sunday.
It emerged that a man who escaped later after hijacking a VW Golf in Plett was allegedly Melumzi Mathole, who has been on the run since two warrants for his arrest were opened in 2012 for housebreaking and theft and possession of stolen property in Thornhill.
Police are also investigating possible links between Sunday’s hijacking and a hostage drama and shootout at a Jeffreys Bay supermarket on Friday night, which left one suspect dead and an employee wounded.
Plett police confirmed yesterday that alcohol found in the boot of a hijacked vehicle could be liquor stolen in a robbery-and-hostage drama which left two people wounded on Saturday.
Police spokesman Captain Malcolm Pojie said three men – two with firearms – accosted a security officer outside Diamond’s Discount Liquor Store in the town’s industrial area just after closing time at 4pm.
The store’s doors were already locked, but an employee heard a commotion outside and unlocked a side door to investigate.
The three men slipped in through the door and instructed everyone inside to get down on the floor.
“The men demanded all the money that had been made that day, but were told by the employees that the cash had already been placed in a drop safe to which they did not have keys.”
One of the suspects then shot a male employee in the legs.
One of the men instructed the employees to start loading liquor into the business’s Toyota Quantum minibus parked outside. An accomplice then fired another shot, hitting an employee in the stomach.
“The men then forced a female employee into the minibus and drove towards the N2,” Pojie said.
The vehicle stopped after about 1km and the woman was forced to help the robbers carry the liquor into the bush. She was then told to run. The men abandoned the vehicle and fled towards Bossiegif.
The later hijackings started in Plett just after 9pm on Saturday at the BP garage in The Crags on the N2, when two armed men hijacked a couple in a Golf who were dropping off a hitchhiker on their way to George.
Mathole and his alleged accomplice, who is under arrest in hospital, forced the couple to drive to Port Elizabeth but they crashed the vehicle near Thornhill in the early hours of Sunday.
Mathole and his accomplice fled the accident scene and paid the driver of another Golf to give them a lift, before hijacking the occupants of this vehicle, too.
A scuffle ensued and Marshall was killed while Mathole’s 26-year-old alleged accomplice was shot in the shoulder.
The wounded suspect was arrested after he sought medical attention at the same Port Elizabeth hospital as some of those injured in the crime spree, who managed to identify him.
Police spokesman Sergeant Majola Nkohli said the man would only be named after he was charged in court in Hankey on Thursday after being discharged from hospital. “He will face charges of robbery, murder, hijacking and attempted murder,” Nkohli said.
“Afterwards, he will be taken to Plettenberg Bay under police guard where he will be charged for the initial hijacking and kidnapping of the couple.
“Other charges could possibly be brought against him.”
This all follows a shootout with Jeffreys Bay police, who killed a 28-year-old suspected robber – from Matatiele near Kokstad – while he and a gang were robbing the Shoprite U Save supermarket about 200m from the police station. A store employee was wounded. Nkohli said detectives were still tracking down the alleged gunman’s next-of-kin.
After a two-hour standoff, Jeffreys Bay police stormed the shop but the robbers managed to escape by posing as customers and store employees.