Durban – As safer festive season operations continue, the KwaZulu-Natal police have arrested almost 1 500 suspects in a week.
Police spokesperson Constable Thenjiswa Ngcobo said that in line with the safer festive season operations, police officers were out in their numbers last week to curb crime and to protect the citizens of the province against acts of criminality.
“Operations conducted during the week starting on November 21, 2022, and ending on November 28, 2022, resulted in the arrest of 1 442 suspects for various offences. These arrests included 28 for murder, 26 for attempted murder, 50 for robberies, 288 for assault and 66 for burglary,” Ngcobo said.
“Police arrested 172 persons for drug-related offences and seized 57kg of drugs, such as cocaine powder, heroin and mandrax across the province. Police officers also seized 1 733 litres of alcohol and arrested 65 persons for liquor-related offences.
“During festive operations conducted during the same week, police seized 37 firearms, including revolvers, pistols, and rifles as well 216 rounds of ammunition.”
Ngcobo said that a large quantity of stolen property such as computers, electrical appliances, cellphones and televisions were also seized by the police.
She advised the public to refrain from buying stolen goods as this drives the market that contributes to the high rate of theft, burglary, robberies and hijackings.
From November 14 until November 20, 1 657 suspects were arrested for various crimes in the province, while from November 7 until November 14 police officers arrested 1 868 suspects for various crimes such as murder, attempted murder, robberies, carjacking, rape, burglary, fraud, malicious damage to property and other cases.
That means that KZN police arrested a total of 4 967 suspects in three weeks.
Daily News