36/1/4/1/201000171

NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

FOR WRITTEN REPLY

QUESTION NO 1861

DATE OF PUBLICATION IN INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER: 4 JUNE 2010

(INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER NO 16- 2010)

Date reply submitted: 14 July 2010

1861.   Ms D Kohler-Barnard (DA) to ask the Minister of Police:

(1)     With reference to the farm murder cases reported in the SA Police Service (SAPS) annual reports of 2006-07 and 2008-09, (a) in which town and province did each murder occur and (b) on what date did each murder take place;

(2)     whether any persons were (a) charged, (b) tried and (c) convicted in each case; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details;

(3)     what is the breakdown of the 794 farm attacks reported to SAPS during the period (a) 2006-07 and (b) 2008-09 in respect of the (i) (aa) town and (bb) province where each attack occurred and (ii) date on which each attack took place;

(4)     whether any persons were (a) charged, (b) tried and (c) convicted in each case; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details? NW2154E

REPLY:

The latest publicly available figures on farm attacks and farm murders were published in the SAPS Annual Report for 2006-07 (pp 275 - 276).  Since then the SAPS has not kept a stand-alone strategic database on these crimes.  The very same figures of 794 farm attacks and 86 farm murders published in the 2006-07 Annual Report were repeated and included by mistake in the 2008-2009 annual report (p 69).  The SAPS and Minister of Police regret this mistake.

To answer question 1861 with regard to the 2006-07 farm attacks and murders will imply that the relevant section in the SAPS will have to work through the old farm attack stand-alone database.  After determining all the relevant CAS numbers, they will then have to work through the original dockets (which would be spread amongst stations across the length and breadth of the country) to establish how many persons were (a) charged (b) tried and (c) convicted in connection with these cases.  That would be an extremely labour-intensive exercise and the Crime Research and Statistics component of Crime Intelligence does not have sufficient resources to readily accomplish such a task. It will take at least two months to procure the relevant data for 2006-07 if urgent operational taskings do not entail any additional delays. To provide full details on the results of court cases linked to the crimes in question, would require a further perusal of the relevant court records. Crime Research and Statistics does not have ready access to such records.

Reply to question 1861 approved by MINISTER

Issued by Parliament, July 15 2010

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