A normal day turned into a nightmare for a pensioner (74) who is still reeling from shock after being kidnapped at gunpoint outside the Rynfield Terrance Shopping Centre, in Pretoria Road, on July 5.
A case of kidnapping has been opened at the Benoni SAPS, the station’s spokesperson Captain Nomsa Sekele confirmed.
Due to his emotional state, the pensioner was unable to speak to the City Times when we visited him and his wife at their Rynfield business last week.
According to his wife, Cheryl Battey, her husband went to the shopping centre at around 10:00 that day.
“Upon leaving the centre he stopped to turn into Vlei Road cards and two from my business. and a man, believed to be one of the ‘job seekers’ standing nearby, got into the back of the vehicle and at gunpoint instructed my husband to drive.
“Somewhere along the route he was told to stop and ordered into the passenger seat where he had to put his head down. The gunman then drove the rest of the way – to an empty house at an unknown location where my husband was put into one of the bedrooms.
“There were three other men in the room, which was only furnished with a bed. They took my husband’s wallet and cellphone and then laid out receipts, which they found in the car and in my husband’s wallet, on the bed.
“They found four bank cards of which two were his British cards and two from my business
“They demanded the PINs for the cards but my husband lied and said he doesn’t know these because the cards belong to his stepdaughter.
“They then demanded the PINs for the UK bank cards and he gave them the PINs.”
“One of the men then left with the bank cards while the other three guarded him.”
Battey said R20 000 was withdrawn from her husband’s bank accounts.
“When the man returned after about an hour, my husband was shoved back into the car and told not to look up. The suspects then fled.
“He phoned me at about 14:00 and was in such a state describing what happened.”
Battey said her husband, a British national who has lived in South Africa for 20 years, is planning on relocating following the incident.
“He hasn’t been coping well. “I thank God they spared his life and that it wasn’t me because imagine what could have happened to me as a woman considering that there was a bed in that room.
“The police should do something about these men loitering outside the centre because it’s clear that not all of them are there looking for a job,” said Battey.
She added that her husband’s daughter, who lives in the UK, has started raising funds via GoFundMe for her father to return home as his savings were cleared out by the criminals during the incident.
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