Former Umkomaas policemen Mayendran Chetty and Thanduxolo Phelago will remain behind bars until their next court appearance.

This as the duo were denied bail in the Scottburgh Magistrate’s Court on Friday after what is believed to be one of the longest bail application hearings in the court’s history.

Chetty and Phelago are facing four counts of murder. Two of the victims were residents of the Umkomaas area, while the remaining two were residents of the Port Shepstone/ Margate area.

One of the victims was the Ward 99 councillor in Umkomaas who had fled the area after receiving death threats and had gone to live in Margate.

Chetty and Phelago were arrested on November 8, 2022, and have been in police custody since then. During the hearings, the court heard that on the night of August 22, 2022, two men had been murdered execution-style in their homes in Magabeni.

Both were allegedly friends of the councillor. It is said the duo’s murderers were both dressed in police uniform.

Two more murders

On September 11, 2022, the councillor and another man were also murdered execution-style, allegedly by three police officers in uniform.

Eyewitnesses reported that both the victims had been forced to kneel on the ground and had then been shot in the back of the head.

Eyewitnesses identified either both Phelago and Chetty or at least one officer, who had spoken English with an ‘Indian’ accent.

Ballistic investigations into the bullets found at the murder scenes indicated that four different firearms had been used, but that in all four murders, one of the firearms had been a revolver.

None of the murder weapons have been recovered.

On the scene

It is alleged that Chetty’s appointment card (police officer’s ID) had been found at one of the crime scenes.

Certain state witnesses have been placed in witness protection programmes as it is feared that if Chetty and Phelago were to be released on bail, these witnesses’ lives would be in danger.

For this reason, Chetty and Phelago had already been denied bail in the Port Shepstone Magistrate’s Court. The two will be formally indicted in the high court on September 15.