IPID investigator alleges Cato Manor unit staged taxi shootings, looted crime scenes

By Simon Nare

Former KwaZulu-Natal Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) investigator Sharmila Williams has disputed the Cato Manor Organised Crime Unit’s version that it shot taxi operators in self-defence.

Williams told the Nkabinde Inquiry, probing the fitness of South Gauteng Director of Public Prosecutions Advocate Andrew Chauke to hold office, that her investigations into crime scenes involving unit members told a different story.

She told the inquiry, chaired by retired Constitutional Court Justice Elizabeth Nkabinde, that in one of the scenes she attended, evidence showed unit members were not under threat as claimed in their statements.

In the incident in which taxi operator Bongani Mkhize was shot while seated in his car, Williams said unit members were allegedly stealing the deceased’s personal belongings.

She said she intervened and took the items from the officers.

Williams testified that it was irregular for an officer involved in a shooting to remain at