Theft of motor vehicles has decreased quite substantially but unfortunately the theft out of motor vehicle and smash and grabs have increased.  Most of the theft out of motor vehicles have occurred in Shopping Centres in Sunninghill while the smash and grabs have occurred on the corner of Maxwell Drive and Witkoppen Road.  Sunninghill Community as well as Eskom have cleared the grass and some bushes to make it easier for motorists to see any would be criminals hanging around.  A big spotlight has also been installed to help light up the intersection.  The smash and grabs in July have dropped significantly.  PLEASE REMEMBER TO KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN WHEN DRIVING THROUGH HERE AND KEEP VALUABLES IN YOUR BOOT.

Although there has been a decrease in residential house breakins in 2010, we are still concerned that these figures remain too high.  Most of these have occurred in complexes and most of the thefts have been laptops and flat screen TV’s.  A number of these theft, especially the laptop ones have been “suspect” and are thought to be insurance fraud.  A sign of the tough economic times we find ourselves in.  The increase in business breakins have occurred in shopping centres with very few being in office parks.

One area that we continue being consistently successful is the violent crimes.  Here we believe our network of dedicated patrol vehicles, live monitored CCTV camera’s and crime prevention operations with the SAPS continue to make a difference.

 “Due to the large number of Police (SAPS) that will be required to actually police the event, the criminals and the security advisors are aware that the World Cup period is going to be like another holiday period for the criminal fraternity. The SAPS will be concentrating on the areas most frequented by visitors/tourists. These will be at the Football stadiums, the Fan parks, ORT airport, hotels in the cities and the routes to the stadiums. This leaves the criminals to have a free run at the suburbs! The criminals are fully aware of this too. They understand that the reaction time for SAPS to get to an incident will be long – if they come at all.” The email goes on to warn of home invasions, driveway robberies, carjackings, kidnappings etc.  

At a recently held SAPS meeting I asked of the Sandton Police whether they had sufficient manpower to protect our suburb and others in Sandton over the worldcup and if we were going to be left vulnerable as the email in circulation suggests.  Those attending the SAPS meeting were told that the Sandton SAPS were to have additional manpower over this time and that they were confident that they would be able to police our suburb adequately, not leaving us exposed.  Certainly the crime prevention operations that the police hold with our security provider, Savika are going ahead over the next few weeks as planned.  Brig Billings the station commander of the Sandton Police Station has made the following response to the email above, again I quote:

“ Brig Billings has asked me to respond to you with regards to the e-mail concerning World Cup Security that you forwarded to him.

Numerous measures have been put in place for the Soccer World Cup, but members of the public must not confuse these measures with normal day to day policing activities.

There are specialized groups of SAPS members that have received call up instructions to police the stadiums, and ensure overall safety during the World Cup.  

These groups are mainly from specialized units, and not part of the normal SAPS members at station level.

Sandton SAPS will still have normal patrols and crime prevention duties.  Additional manpower for the World Cup is coming from members who are off duty, they will be called up during their off days to specifically patrol areas in Sandton which have been identified as high influx of tourists, and possible problem areas.

The focus for the SAPS is not only to police the World Cup, but to continue policing the station precinct as we would before and after the World Cup.

Please note that Sandton SAPS does not comment on World Cup related matters, only the Provincial office may.”

As many residents have sent me the “Worldcup Security Brief” email and are very concerned about the content of this email I felt the need to respond to all.  Our security team in Sunninghill is as concerned as you are, however we would hate this email to cause panic amongst our residents.  We run a tight ship in our suburb and have discussed the potential security threat this event might hold for us and have put plans in place to secure our area from criminals.  Our security company will be working very closely with our Sector Policing saps manager, who is very dedicated to Sunninghill.  Manpower, we are not short of and Savika are always available to assist the Sandton SAPS with any and all crime prevention operations.

We are entering an exciting few weeks and we as a team will be doing our bit.  Guards are being trained on what to look for over this time; guards are been retrained on pro-active patrolling and visible policing; rewards are being offered to our guards and reaction officers.  These rewards will vary in amounts depending on the information received or arrest made.  You know we will do our best — what can you do?  Be vigilant and report ANYTHING out of the ordinary or suspicious to 0861savika.  Don’t be complacent with your security, especially now.  Make sure you set your alarms and make sure they are working.  Phone your security providers control room, don’t tell them who you are and notify them that you wish to test your alarm.  Re-iterate to your domestics the rules about who they let into your homes.  The motto of “don’t trust anyone” is a good one.  When you celebrate the soccer, don’t neglect your security – don’t leave gates open, don’t leave garage doors open and if you need to press your panic button – remember – press it once and hold it down for a second or two.  DO not press and press again, many systems if you press the panic twice too quickly the one will cancel the other.  

If we are community minded, look out for each other, are vigilant and “security wise”, we will be fine. Let’s not let these fears ruin our celebrations – enjoy your soccer and go Bafana Bafana!!!

Security:

a)     Residential burglaries – we are pleased to be able to say that there has been a dramatic drop in residential burglaries in the past three weeks.  After going through a rather rough patch with residential burglaries averaging at around 5 – 6 per week in the entire Sunninghill, we have now seen a drop to an average over the past three weeks to between 1 and 2 per week in the entire suburb.  A special thanks to Savika Armed Response who increased their patrols in hotspot areas, this definitely seems to have worked.

b)     Smash and grabs – these unfortunately have now increased substantially.  The hotspot for these as has been in the past is on the corner of Maxwell and Witkoppen roads.  The criminals seem to alternate there times making it difficult for the saps and Savika to catch them.  The most common times are between 06h00 and 8h00 and 18h00 and 19h30.  At present the smash and grabs are averaging at between 4 and 5 per week.  The cars targeted are those entering Sunninghill driving west and the victims seem to be the 4^th of 5^th vehicle in the left or middle lane, stopping at the traffic light.  These smash and grabs will be discussed at length in our security meeting scheduled for tomorrow morning.

c)     Crime stats – due to the world cup soccer our weekly meetings with the saps have been cancelled between the 11^th of June and the 11^th of July.  Sunninghill Community Security will however be continuing to hold its weekly crime analysis and crime prevention meetings.  We would like to appeal to all residents, businesses and security companies to report to us via our webpage www.sunninghillnews.co.za – report a crime tab -all incidents of crime during this time as we will not be receiving crime statistics from the saps.  For our crime prevention operations to continue efficiently it is important for us to receive this information.  Those of you who use other security companies (not Savika), please encourage them to report crime to us.  They should always be doing this – the only security company that at present does this is Savika.

d)     Eskom strike – as you are all aware there was an unprotected Eskom strike outside of Megawatt Park last week.  Although there were a very large number of strikers the protest was without incident.  Sunninghill Community would like to thank Eskom for keeping us “in the loop” with regards to developments before and during the strike, affording us the opportunity to put in plans to protect our area should it have been necessary.  Special thanks to the saps, metro who handled the situation very professionally and for the assistance of Savika Armed Response and the Sunninghill Communities Chief traffic warden, Jerry Tom who directed traffic when necessary and kept a watchful eye to ensure there were no problems.  A community working together!!.

Grime:

a)     Monthly litter campaign – Good news – Builders Warehouse has notified us that they will as of this month sponsor casuals to pick up litter in Sunninghill every second month.  The idea was that this would supplement Plover Realty who have kindly offered to sponsor the other month, allowing us to make this a monthly cleanup operation.    

8 days to go — keep those flags flying high.

Sunninghill Park and Gardens – with these two areas having the highest number of incidents reported and in Sunninghill Estates with the lowest. 

The vast majority of these crimes were committed in complexes where only laptops were stolen.  What is blatantly obvious is that the perpetrators knew that the victims had laptops and that this is all they were after.  In some cases there was no sign of forced entry and in some cases windows were left open.

As ridiculous as it may sound, I urge you to keep your curtains drawn or blinds down when you work on your laptops and when you are not working on them, put them out of sight.  Please also ensure that your domestic is 100% trustworthy.  Most of these crimes are committed with assistance – information passed on or other.

Although we are, as is all of Sandton, experiencing these thefts we are still significantly down compared to previous years and other suburbs on violent crimes.

Linda Gildenhuys

Sunninghill Community Security – security@suncomm.co.za 083 440 2381

Sunninghill Community would like to thank the Sandton Saps for being pro-active in warning the community they protect of these criminals and congratulate them on the bravery of the officers involved in this arrest.  Residents should continue being alert as the criminals arrested are probably not the only members of this notorious gang, however the arrests made yesterday will have a huge impact on these criminals being able to operate in Sandton. 

It is time we as South Africans took our Country back from the criminals and we in the Sandton Policing district are certainly doing so.  Sunninghill Community is proud to be associated with The Sandton Saps!!

Sent: Friday, April 02, 2010 9:02 AM

To: info@paulshof.org

“Subject: Paulshof Community / PLEASE READ THIS MAIL – YOUR SAFETY IS AT STAKE!

This is an e-mail from ‘Paulshof Community’ Message: PLEASE READ THIS DOCUMENT – YOUR SAFETY IS AT STAKE! 

PAULSHOF BUSINESS MAN MURDERED IN HIJACKING This Monday evening – 29th March 2010 – a gentleman was shot dead in an apparent hijacking in Paarl Lane opposite the Tequesta complex. The reports are not very clear but it seems as though he may have been followed home and ambushed. Radio news is reporting a possible link to a gang known as The Blue Light Gang. This is the latest in a series of violent crimes we have experienced in the last few months. Paulshof residents are asked to be extremely vigilant and careful at this time as crime has escalated dramatically all over Gauteng. This is no doubt a result of the economic recession and related factors. Therefore we must expect the trend to continue for the foreseeable future.”

To the Paulshof Community,  

On behalf of your neighbours here in Sunninghill, we would like to offer our condolences to the family of the victim of this senseless attack and indeed our condolences to the entire community of Paulshof.  No words can express our shock and horror at what transpired in Paulshof on Monday evening. 

We would like to join our neighbours and friends in Paulshof in their plea to our communities and all those around us to join forces against this unspeakable, vicious behaviour.  Only if we stand united can we have any say in protecting ourselves.  Please, if you are not a contributing member of your Ratepayers and security association, become one!  It really is a matter of life or death!! 

Linda Gildenhuys;

Sunninghill Community Security – The Security branch of your Ratepayers Association

security@suncomm.co.za – 083 440 2381

At our weekly meeting with the Sandton saps this morning a rather alarming trend was brought to our attention and the Sandton saps requested that we warn resident of this trend.

Over the past few weeks there have been a number of car-jackings in Sandton, Randburg and the Douglasdale policing districts.  A large volume of these car-jackings were committed by suspects in unmarked vehicles with blue lights on the dashboard.  The suspects –four of them are dressed in full Police uniforms and are heavily armed.  The driver is described as (white or coloured – light complexion, who always stays in the vehicle) and the other three, black males.  The unmarked vehicles, differ, some Audi A4, Golfs, Runx etc. They pull vehicles off the road – expensive vehicles – take control of the vehicle and together with the unmarked vehicle drive around for an hour or so with the victim before “dumping” the victim in some remote spot.  Most of these crimes have been committed at night.

Sunninghill Community Security recently had a similar incident reported to us where a Sunninghill resident was pulled off the road in Midrand by criminals dressed in full Metro Police uniforms with badges.  The victim was pulled over for a so called speeding ticket, taken to a unmarked panel van (the ones we see at the side of the road with cameras), forced inside, while one criminal took her car and also driven around for quite some time before she was dumped, tied up at the side of the road.

The SAPS have requested that we warn residents of the above, but cannot unfortunately; give any advice on how to handle being pulled off the road by a vehicle with blue lights.  One of the security representatives at this meeting suggested that should this happen to you, that you slow down, open your window and indicate to this unmarked vehicle that you have seen him and that he should follow you.  You should then drive slowly to the nearest filling station, shopping centre, anywhere busy or to the police station.  While doing so you should phone 10111 or 112 from your cell phone.  We reiterate that this was advice from a security representative and not from the SAPS.

If this happens to you in Sunninghill, please phone Savika immediately.  You should have their number on speed dial on your cell phone – 0861savika translates to 0861728452

Linda Gildenhuys

Sunninghill Community Security – security@suncomm.co.za 083 440 2381

These crimes are very difficult to curb as the culprits escape very quickly onto the N1.  We would once again request of residents not to keep anything of value inside your car.  Put your handbags and briefcases etc in your boot and keep your cellphones out of view.  This way you will not become a victim.

A number of measures are being implemented to try and curb this crime, including patrols by security companies in Sunninghill and the SAPS.  Unfortunately these are visible and once gone the criminals once again strike.  We have appealed to Sanral via our Ward Councillor to erect concrete palisading to prevent easy access to and from the freeway.  We will inform you of their response to our appeal.

The vast majority of these crimes occur during peak hour traffic and as a result make it impossible for their victims to avoid them.  Between 06h30 and 09h00 in the morning and between 16h00 and 20h00 at night.

Please keep your eyes and ears open when stopped at any intersection and keep OFF your cellphones and keep your valuables in your boot.