Nelspruit detective arrested on corruption charges

A case against a 34-year-old Nelspruit police detective, who was arrested on charges of corruption, has been postponed to July 31 in the Nelspruit Magistrate’s Court.

Constable Innocent Macibelo was arrested by the Nelspruit-based Hawks on June 8 for alleged corruption.

A Hawks spokesperson, Warrant Officer Thandi Tshabalala, said in a statement that Macibelo had been in the police service for seven years at the time of his arrest. She said on November 25 last year, Macibelo arrested a man, named only ‘Mashele’ in the statement, on domestic violence related charges.

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She said Mashele had left his hunting rifle at a friend’s house just before he was arrested. The statement said that as soon as Macibelo had heard about the rifle, he rushed to Mashele’s friend’s house and told the man he was arresting him for the possession of an unlicensed firearm.

Macibelo took the man back to the station where he took down his statement. Macibelo then allegedly demanded an amount of R500 from the man, and told him he would give the money to his other colleagues to keep them from speaking about the incident.

The man allegedly gave the R500 to Macibelo, however, the constable later allegedly called the man again and demanded another R3 000 in order to keep the court magistrate from charging him.

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Tshabalala said the man had allegedly transferred R1 000 to Macibelo, but the officer continued to call him, allegedly requesting the remaining R2 000. The man then decided to report the incident. Macibelo was arrested following an investigation into the matter by the unit.

Tshabalala said Macibelo had first appeared in court on June 8 and was released on bail. It is unknown how much the bail amount was. Macibelo will appear in the Nelspruit Magistrate’s Court again on July 31.