Armed gangs target Berea
Blue Security report a number of armed robberies on businesses and residences in the Berea over the past week.
THERE has been a spate of armed robberies reported in the Berea over the past week, with gangs targeting residents and businesses in Morningside and Overport.
Blue Security managing director Darryn le Grange said the company’s crime statistics revealed four armed robberies in the area over the past week. “A gang of armed house robbers driving a grey Mercedes gained entry onto on a property through an unsecured gate in Anerley Road in Morningside,” Le Grange said.
“The gang held up the residents and robbed them of their cellphones, iPods, latops, a DVD player, cash and jewellery.”
He said in three separate incidents armed robbers held up business owners in Kenilworth Road in Overport, in First Avenue and in Station Road in Stamfordhill Hill.
In Kennilworth Road two armed men held up a business owner as she was paying her staff and robbed her of cash and a cellphone, while in Station Road two armed men driving a white VW Polo held up the owner and fled with laptops, two handbags, three cellphones and cash.
“ Robbers armed with a knife tried to steal shoes from a shop in First Avenue but the robbery was foiled when the owner pulled out his gun and the suspects fled,” he said.
Housebreakers broke into properties in Newcombe Place and Musgrave Road on the Berea; in Haraldene Road in Glenwood, in Loon Road in Sherwood and in Umbilo Road. They fled with computers, laptops, iPads, a TV; a radio amplifier; a bicycle; copper cables; a cellphone and an Orbitrek fitness machine.
Le Grange said criminals tended to target properties in the early hours of the morning, at lunchtime as well as in the evening when families were relaxed and busy with dinner and children’s homework.
“We urge residents to be vigilant at all times and to keep external security beams armed as these are an early warning system that will sound the alarm the moment an intruder is present,” Le Grange said.
He urged business owners to install CCTV surveillance cameras, as a deterrent and as a useful tool that could provide valuable evidence to the police following a crime.
