NPA had 6.5% conviction rate for 20 000 lockdown cases

THE National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has secured a 6.5% conviction rate for the more than 20 000 cases for contraventions of Covid-19 regulations between March and June.

This happened as of the 1 572 finalised cases, fines were given in 996, in 285 there were wholly suspended sentences, in 80 cases, the accused were sentence to imprisonment and in 183 cases, the accused were cautioned, among others.

Justice Minister Ronald Lamola revealed this in response to parliam entary questions from DA MP Okkie Terblanche, who asked about successful prosecutions for contravention of the Covid-19 regulations since March 26.

Lamola said all cases referred to the NPA were screened and those with reasonable prospects of success were placed on the roll.

He also said there were 24 092 first appearance cases relating to the contraventions of the regulations during the period. This involved 46 812 accused people.

The breakdown of the cases stood at 12 768 cases (27 947 accused people) during alert level 5 between March and April 30.

There were 8 487 cases (14 275 accused) that were recorded during level 4 in May and 2 837 others (4 590 accused) during level 3 in June.

Lamola also said the NPA finalised 1 572 cases, which translated to a 6.5% conviction rate out of the 24 092 cases.

The statistics indicated that in March-April there were 910 convictions involving 1 667 people. The figure dropped to 591 cases and 899 people in May.

It further declined to 71 cases and 96 people the next month.

“The majority of convicted cases relate to the failure to be confined to residence during the lockdown period,” Lamola said.

But, Police Minister Bheki Cele provided a different set of statistics covering March 27 up to July 4.

Cele said police charged 27 9151 people for contravention of the regulations and that 26 033 had been convicted.

DA MP Glynnis Breytenbach had also asked the number of cases that was either withdrawn, returned for further investigation or placed on a court roll.

Lamola said 776 cases were withdrawn during the period, which represented 4% of the total first appearance cases.

A total of 12 354 cases (67.3%) had been postponed for further investigation to ensure the cases were finalised by the next court appearance date.