Carte Blanche TV

[Mad Dog]

View PostLeTurbo, on 20 June 2011 - 03:26 , said:

Well, so far, looking at the poll, it looks like there isn't really a problem with bike jackings. Everyone relax, go back to riding your favourite trails around Rhodes Mem or wherever. You don't have to consider emmigration. It's all been blown out of proportion.

 

 

Lets see what you say when you've been held in the bushes at gunpoint for 20-min and strip searched coz they cant understand why you go riding with only R30 and no credit cards!!!

 

@ LeTurbo... Don't worry it will never happen to you... remember it alway happens to others and never to yourself.....

[Red Zone]

Never jacked but had 7 bikes stolen over the years

[nathrix]

Watch Carte Blanche this Sunday. They will be running a segment highlighting the recent #bikejackingsa.

 

@bicyclesafetysa on Twitter

 

Safe-Cycling Initiative

 

Bicycle Safety on Facebook

Edited August 2, 2011 by nathrix™ ® ©

[The Drongo]

uhm..picture 2,3,4 and 7 look like the same man but in each pic just different facial expression...check it out for yourslef

 

[The Drongo]

Well done to Nathrix, Dangle and others involved !

 

Now can anyone do anything about that chop in Cape Town?

[messenger]

SC recons Derek and his mates will air this story coming Sunday....? Or was I listening like a tonsil again?

Could go either way; or rather two ways... One bike-jackings will decline / stop.

(2) as has been discussed at lenght; a brave civil may stop and confront someone with a suspicious bike (and it may not end well).... Lets hope for One only!!!

 

But lets face it - if "Bad Brad" (yes, sterio...) does make waves when he sees a bike he feels the ower should not have - it could end badly....

[chris_w_65]

uhm..picture 2,3,4 and 7 look like the same man but in each pic just different facial expression...check it out for yourslef

 

Maybe they just all look the same

[nathrix]

Thank you to everyone who submitted their story and participated in the discussions to create awareness as it wouldn't have been possible without your help. Also a special thanks to everyone involved behind the scenes and to Admin (Matt) for assisting where possible and in helping to create awareness on The Hub SA and Twitter. We are not finished with this initiative as this will be an ongoing project, let's carry on with the momentum we all have created in such a short time period and be vigilant out there. Be Safe.

 

Carte Blanche expose on Bike-Jacking

 

Part I http://beta.mnet.co.za/carteblanche/Article.aspx?Id=4401&ShowId=1

 

Part II http://beta.mnet.co.za/carteblanche/Article.aspx?Id=4401&ShowId=1

 

Date:    	07 August 2011 07:00
Producer: 	Kate Barry
Presenter: 	Derek Watts
Researcher: 	Susan Comrie
               Leila Dougan
Show: 	        Carte Blanche

 

Mountain biking is the biggest participation sport in South Africa. We have beautiful trails, great events and nothing quite compares to riding out in the veld. But more and more mountain bikers are being hijacked. It was next to this quarry [on screen] near Botha Avenue in Centurion that a lone cyclist was attacked.

 

Mathilda Williams (Mountain biker): 'I was coming across the railway line over there. I heard this guy from behind and he grabbed hold of my saddle. He looked angry and I shouted at him to leave me alone, and that is the last I remember.'

 

John Williams (Father-in-law): "She was late, we got worried and we followed the route we thought she would take. We found an hydration pack lying on the path... and then later came across Mathilda next to the fence, bleeding profusely and unconscious.'

 

Mathilda: 'I was stabbed, yes... with shears... just half of a shears."

 

Derek Watts (Carte Blanche presenter): "Garden shears.'

 

Mathilda: "Garden shears.'

 

John: 'Severed an artery... the clipper went between two of her vertebrae and actually touched her spinal cord, so she was badly injured.'

 

Mathilda: 'Then I was in a coma for a month. When I got out of the coma I was placed into rehab and I was there for a month... had to learn to walk again, had speech therapy, physiotherapy... and, ja... So my life has changed completely.'

 

But the attacker didn't steal her bicycle. All he took was her cellphone. Mathilda's balance has been affected and she can no longer ride a bike. But that hasn't stopped her hitting the trails on a tandem with her husband.

 

Derek: 'It's not often on Carte Blanche that we have too many case studies to choose from. But for this story our producer really had to narrow it down and decide which hijacking - or bike-jacking - to highlight. And there really has been a huge increase in this crime over the past few months.'

 

In March Alec Lambrecht was cycling alone in Krugersdorp when he was attacked and stabbed seven times.

 

Alec Lambrecht (Mountain biker): 'As I turned right, he was sprinting towards me and tried to grab me off my handlebars. I fell down and immediately he was on top of me. And I grabbed the pepper spray and I sprayed him. He took a knife out of his pocket and he opened the knife, and I think he stabbed me in the back of my lung on the right-hand side... There is another one on my triceps. And I turned around and I faced him and I thought: 'I need to fight this guy.' And he cut my tendons off on my left hand... left arm."

 

Derek: "That looks quite bad!"

 

Alec: "That is it, ja... this one here. And I had him by this hand (and he was left-handed) and he stabbed me all over here... right in the chest here as well. And he was talking to me in a calm voice the whole time and he was saying: 'Sit down. I'm going to kill you.' And I thought: 'You're not going to kill me... not today. I'm going to fight here!' As I bumped him away I heard a voice in my head saying, 'Trust me, trust me...' And I'm a Christian and I'm a believer in God, and for that moment I just pointed at him and I said: 'In the name of Jesus Christ you can't hurt me; I command you to stop.' And he stopped."

 

Alec spent two nights in ICU and needed extensive surgery on his wrist. He has since started a Facebook group, and will never cycle alone again.

 

Alec: 'I think if you ride alone you die alone.'

 

But even larger groups have been attacked. Francois Karstel, and John and Mertz Daniel were part of a group of six cyclists ambushed by seven hijackers at Mnandi in June.

 

John Daniel (Mountain biker): 'He actually tried to inflict a wound in my shoulder with his knife. And Mertz shouted... and saw him, and shouted 'There is somebody at the back as well!' So they got us to lie down and they took our shoes immediately. Because they said to Mertz she must go into the bushes immediately and we must go forward. And Mertz, with the crisis and the shock, actually walked into the bushes with this one person with the knife. And I realised this is not on, you know, something going on... So I walked to her, took her by the hand and said: 'Come with me.' And the chap at that point pulled his trigger and it was fortunately a misfire.'

 

Derek: 'Mertz, if John hadn't intervened, do you think you might have been raped?'

 

Mertz Daniel (Mountain biker) 'I don't want to think about it, but yes... I think my friends would have helped me.'

 

While their victims lay on the ground, the hijackers made off with the six bikes.

 

Derek: 'Apart from the trauma here, how big was their haul in monetary value.'

 

Francois Karstel (Mountain biker): 'A bike like this is worth about R30 000... also, items like gloves, cellphones, wallets... that kind of thing.'

 

John: 'The police officer totalled it up to R275 000.'

 

Derek: 'A bike used to help you get to school and, if you had a Sturmey Archer 3-speed, you were at the top of your game. But now it is a hi-tech world with radical materials, and a bike like this can cost as much as a small car.'

 

Andrew McLean: 'Anything up to probably R70 000... R80 000 and probably the norm would be the kind of bikes that are probably in the R30 000... R40 000 range.'

 

Andrew McLean is a legend in South African cycling, having won every major event both on and off-road and says bike-jacking is affecting his business.

 

Andrew: 'There's two big hotspots - just north-west of Midrand and Irene - and almost weekly now there is a story of a near-miss or a hijacking.'

 

Derek: 'So riding on your own through isolated areas like this is not the wisest thing to do. And, as we've seen, larger groups have also been attacked. In fact, earlier this year an organised mountain bike event in Irene was also hit by hijackers. Thankfully, a concerted effort by police and the community has made a big difference.'

 

The fields behind Jan Smuts House in Irene have been the scene of recent hijackings.

 

Herman: "The koppie in front here is where they operated now. Also, on top of it... normally they've got guys on top of it, getting information through to the guys moving and operating on ground level and waiting in the long grass for the people. We also deploy now on this koppie over weekends and with the police.'

 

Colonel Neels Kleynhans of the Lyttelton police station told us about their joint effort.

 

Colonel Neels Kleynhans (SAPS: Lyttelton): 'Somewhere in March we had two jackings. It went on... in April we had one, in May we had one, in June we had one."

 

Derek: "So you saw a pattern here?"

 

Colonel Kleynhans: "We saw a pattern. Always two people, always with knives, always in the same area always."

 

Derek: "And over weekends?"

 

Colonel Klenyhans: "Weekends... Saturdays and Sundays, always round about 10 o'clock. We started after third... second incident... we started doing observation there.'

 

They took photographs of suspects, but were never able to catch them. But on the 6th of June they had a breakthrough when the hijackers struck again.

 

Colonel Kleynhans: 'A cycling group was cycling also the same route, and they saw this robbery. And they started pursuing these people. They tried to run off with the bicycles, but these guys are very fit, so they caught up with them. So they throw the bicycles down and they start running into the bushes. There they lost some of them and they arrested one of them there.'

 

Herman: "We actually caught one of them just here [on screen]. He ran off all the way through the fields to the area of the railway station.'

 

Colonel Kleynhans: 'And this one interestingly has led them to all the robberies. So, all five of the robberies... we linked it to this guy. He is charged, case currently in court.'

 

Derek: 'What can you tell us about the suspect here?'

 

Colonel Kleynhans 'He's part of a gang, definitely, and we also think this is a South African citizen himself, but it is Mozambicans involved, because some of the bicycles are really going from here through courier vehicles. They pay people to courier vehicles through the Lebombo border to Mozambique and they sell the bicycles that side.'

 

The other hijacking hotspot is the Midrand area. It was here that Troy Pople was robbed at knifepoint while riding his new bike worth R75 000.

 

Troy Pople (Mountain biker): 'We were coming up the road, Dennis and myself, on Saturday morning and we saw three guys start walking down in single file. And the moment they went past... the first guy... then I realised this was not 100%. Then the knives were out and I heard Dennis swear and he had turned and gone back down the hill. And the guy chased him and the other guy standing up here had the knife out and asked for the bike, which I gave him... and then he wanted my cellphone. Then I looked down the hill and saw that Dennis had gotten away, with the other two guys running up. And I gave him... when the other two guys got there... I handed over the phone. One of them got on my bike and went up this way[on screen] into the long grass, and that was that.'

 

Derek: "By the end of June there were three hijackings a week in this area. But then, a breakthrough: two arrests made by an ordinary vigilant member of the public... A cycling enthusiast who saw two stolen bicycles and decided action had to be taken.'

 

Andy Masters (Mountain biker): 'I saw that one of the bikes was a red-and-white specialised Epic and it had 29 inch wheels. There [is] only two of them in Johannesburg and one of them was hijacked the week previously.'

 

Andy Masters had seen pictures of Troy's bike posted on The Hub, a cycling website.

 

Andy: 'And I pulled in here in the first entrance-way to actually move over and have a look at the bikes. And the one guy just immediately threw the red specialised bike at me, which was a pretty clear indication that it didn't belong to him. So I put the bike into the back of the Cruiser and then chased off after them'

 

It was the local community living in this settlement who helped Andy catch the two suspects.

 

Andy: 'I didn't know who the bike belonged to, so I phoned Andrew McClean and he put it out on his Twitter.'

 

Troy: "I got a phone call from a group of mates saying 'Have you been on Twitter?' I said: 'No.' They said: they think they've found your bike, And Andrew McClean had said they'd recovered a bike, please contact him. And I phoned Andy, who was involved in recovering the bike ... and, ja, I got my bike back.'

 

The suspects are two Zimbabweans - the Gumbe brothers.

 

Andy: 'They told us they were selling the bikes for a thousand rand... at the time that was what they were getting per bike. And they'd also told us that the two bikes that they'd delivered previously a couple of days beforehand had gone off over the border to Zimbabwe. And we've managed to link them to 12 other cases.'

 

The red-capped suspect [on screen] is allegedly the same man who ordered Mertz into the bushes. His brother is the man who fired at John.

 

Troy joined an awareness ride in July and went to thank the community for helping to recover his bike.

 

Michael: 'Morning, morning!'

 

A week later Midrand police held the country's first bicycle roadblock. They stopped commuters who were riding expensive-looking bicycles into Olievenhoutsbosch. Six other Zimbabwean suspects have recently been arrested in this township, according to Colonel Steven Moodley.

 

Colonel Steven Moodley (SAPS: Midrand): 'Three of them were found in possession of valuable bikes. They were taken into custody. The investigations there led us to pick up three more suspects for armed robbery. They were positively identified.'

 

He has promised a more co-ordinated approach to the problem.

 

Colonel Moodley: "So we need to have a concerted effort with the police, together with members of our cycling fraternity, to work with us in terms of identifying these bikes. And if we have to go to our borders with them and engage with them on our borders as well, then we need to do that in order to stop these bikes, if they are going across our borders.'

 

Andy: 'We've got to do this as a community. If we want our trails back, then we as mountain bikers have to come up and give up a little bit of our time and make the trails safe.'

[cwisking]

Hey guys, not sure if this has been said yet. but what if we could organize something of our own protection services for some trails. ie, maybe there should be like R20 added onto our club fees or license fees etc, or perhaps even event fees, maybe that money could be invested in securing trails, or providing private trails.

 

We as riders need to take a social responsibility in this as well. otherwise it will hurt this awesome sport.

 

It was just a thought so dnt shoot me down.

[Wyatt Earp]

Hey guys, not sure if this has been said yet. but what if we could organize something of our own protection services for some trails. ie, maybe there should be like R20 added onto our club fees or license fees etc, or perhaps even event fees, maybe that money could be invested in securing trails, or providing private trails.

 

We as riders need to take a social responsibility in this as well. otherwise it will hurt this awesome sport.

 

It was just a thought so dnt shoot me down.

Great idea, you guys just need a way to implement it.

Feel free to join our FB group (in my signature) and share it there so that the other Durban boys can see your suggestion.