Tweni residents take back their suburb

An incredible community effort has resulted in a copper thief being nabbed.

The suspect appeared in the Port Shepstone Magistrate‘s court last Friday.

The case was postponed to Thursday, April 1 for bail application.

He is facing charges of being in possession of suspected stolen property (copper cables from a power box). Plenty of tools used to cut and chop up the copper cable was recovered.

A second man was arrested, but he was released due to insufficient evidence.

During the early hours of Wednesday (March 17), information was received that copper thieves were tampering with the power station in Ambleside Road, across from the Tweni Bowling Club.

Tired of the ongoing criminal activity in the area, a group of Tweni residents, Captain Gert Bosman, Ozzie Mthethwa, Roland Andrews and Hugh Lawrence literally jumped out of bed to stop their power box from being tampered with.

Karel Beetge of Ratel Armed Reaction also responded.

It’s the second time in a short period that that power station was vandalized and copper cables dug up and stolen in the area.

It appears that criminals are now taking advantage of loadshedding and using these blackout periods as a window of opportunity to steal the copper cables.

Karel chased the thief for about three kilometres through dense bush and on to the beach until he was cornered at the Umzimkhulu river.

The men agreed that this was a community effort and hopefully future criminals will take note.

“Without this combined effort, we could not have achieved what we did on Wednesday morning. Many other community members unknown to me, did assist and I thank them,” said Captain Bosman.

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