Officers’ conduct in store shocks

Unconcerned, they walked away, leaving broken glass and the contents of the bottle strewn about on the floor of the aisle

March 14, 2014

2 minutes read

DANIAL COXEN of Gladiator Street writes:

It is coming up for a year since the appointment of Brig Marx as Kempton Park SAPS station commander.

Like thousands of other honest ratepayers in this town, I had hopes that he would make some effort to clean up the local police force and change the public’s perception of it as a corrupt, incompetent shambles.

Sadly, this does not appear to be happening. Every day I see police vehicles being used to drop off and pick up kids at school or police in full uniform using their vehicles to do their shopping at shopping malls.

The latest incident of this occurred when I was in a local supermarket. There, two members of the police force were filling their trolley when one of the bottles of wine they had put in it fell out and smashed on the floor.

Unconcerned, they walked away, leaving broken glass and the contents of the bottle strewn about on the floor of the aisle. I followed them out of the supermarket and watched as they loaded their purchases into a police car and drove away.

If misuse of public money, in the manner I have described, is condoned by Brig Marx, let him confirm this through the columns of your newspaper. If it is not, then let him state what he is doing to prevent it.

Brig Johannes Marx, Kempton Park SAPS station commander, responds:

I appreciate the information provided by the community. As I’ve said on several occasions, the community is the eyes and ears of the police. Information that was received from the community was treated as urgent and steps were taken where police acted wrongly and not in the interest of the community or police.

The complainant is more than welcome to make contact with me so that a detailed statement can be taken and any misconduct by the police officers be investigated.

I want to emphasise that if police officers are making themselves guilty of misconduct, the registration number of the vehicle or the names of the members be forwarded to myself on 082-449-7447082-449-7447or the following numbers: