Latest news with #LawEnforcementAdvancementPlan
Eyewitness News
4 days ago
- Eyewitness News
Gun violence flares up in Vrygrond, police officer shot dead
CAPE TOWN - Gun violence has flared up again in the Vrygrond area of Cape Town. In the latest shooting, a 48-year-old police sergeant was killed outside his home in the early hours of Friday morning. ALSO READ: A community member in the area spoke to Eyewitness News on condition of anonymity "Remember, ShotSpotter does not cover that area, although it is deemed as a red zone and because of the taxi violence that took place here. I don't understand why the city hasn't deployed [ShotSpotter]. JP [Smith] hasn't deployed more law enforcement officers." Cape Town Safety and Security MMC JP Smith said that although they do assist police with certain issues, they can only do so within their allocated areas "LEAP [Law Enforcement Advancement Plan] is not deployed in that area. It is not a leap area. We've issued press statements recently explaining where the LEAP areas are. We've deployed in terms of the crime stats to the highest crime rate areas."
Eyewitness News
27-05-2025
- Politics
- Eyewitness News
Law enforcement fighting tooth and nail to rid Cape Town of crime stigma
CAPE TOWN - Western Cape Community Safety and Police Oversight MEC Anroux Marais says law enforcement agencies in the province are doing all they can to reverse the perception of Cape Town as the country's murder capital. She was responding to billionaire businessman Johann Rupert's comments at the White House last week. Rupert mentioned the Cape Flats as a place with the highest murder rate, adding that it was experiencing gang warfare. Despite seeing a drop in murders between January and March this year, the Western Cape is still one of the four provinces with the highest number of murders reported. The Western Cape crime statistics released on Monday show a decrease of 44 murders for the period under review compared to the same period last year. Murders went from 1,112 from January to March 2024, to 1,068 during the same period in 2025. Marais said law enforcement agencies were trying their best to take the numbers even lower. "We do have our Anti-Gang Unit and a strategy that we are looking at. Our LEAP [Law Enforcement Advancement Plan] officers really did fantastic work with SAPS [South African Police Service], and there was a decrease in the crime rate, specifically in some areas." Gang violence has been identified as the number two reason for the high number of murders in the province.
