Amnesty Hearings — Bloemfontein — 1998-08-17

MR MALAN: Did you write this letter before or after the incident?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: This letter was in answer to my reprimand that I received in an explanation that they were not involved in anything and I wrote this after they acted.  People were killed and this investigation could not be continued.

MR MALAN: Mr Madasa, I'm asking you please to lead your client.  Really he's now referring now to matters after the event which really is not relevant either to motive or to the act.  Please let us not deal with evidence from your client that is really not relevant to his own application.
	May I just ask you Mr de Ru, you said that you only wanted to arrest the people and by a question by the Chairperson you said that things went wrong because when you heard the shots you thought you got attacked.  Just please explain to me, your information is here are people who are very heavily armed and in your head you are thinking that they might have AK47s at least.  Would you have expected that they would shoot?  You expected that this is going to be a shootout in some way or another?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes we expected it, that's why our people were armed, that's correct.

MR MALAN: Now what I would like to know from you is how did you think you were going to arrest them?  Did you think if you threw two shock grenades they'll throw down their weapons, get up, put their hands in the air and say take me?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: That's what I believed, I believed they would give themselves up.  It's not quite easily that when a shock grenade goes off that you are not frightened.  I believe that they would give themselves up.

MR MALAN: Do you not think that if they heard a shot or explosion they would not fire?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: It's very difficult for me to say what their reaction would have been but I believed that they would give themselves up and the moment we made it clear to them that they were surrounded they'd give themselves up.  This is not normal police procedure where you go to a person and say we're arresting this person.  We wanted to create a shock effect on them and that's why we used the shock grenades so that they can realise that there's a very strong action taking place against them.

CHAIRPERSON: You're you talking about AK's but what weapons did you find in the car?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: A 765 pistol, two of them and a 38 revolver.

CHAIRPERSON: Where was it found?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: The one 765 pistol was found with the person at the side of the shop about a metre and a half away from him but he was not in the vehicle and the 38 was found on the right side stuck inside his belt.

CHAIRPERSON: Not in his hand?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No and the other person's weapon was found after he was taken out of the vehicle.  We found the weapon - he had an overall, a type of overall thing and the weapon was found in that.

CHAIRPERSON: But not in his hand?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No not in his hand.

CHAIRPERSON: And they only had two 765's and a 38, no AK47's nothing like that?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No, nothing like that.

CHAIRPERSON: And them came to do what, to rob this place?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes to rob the shop.

CHAIRPERSON: And they only had these small firearms?

ADV SOGODI: Do you know when you threw these shock grenades what were these people doing?   Had they started to go into the shop or was it even before they went into the shop?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: It was before they entered the shop.

MR MADASA: They were still sitting inside the car?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: That's correct.

CHAIRPERSON: The doors were not opened yet?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No, they were still inside the vehicle.

ADV SOGODI: I mean as an experienced policeman did you - couldn't you even wait for them to start doing something before actually throwing the hand grenade and shocking them?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: The instruction from Colonel Swanepoel was to arrest them before they actually got physically involved with the robbery because they were scared that people might be held hostage whilst this robbery was taking place or that they might shoot someone.  My instruction was specifically to arrest them before they commit the robbery.

CHAIRPERSON: Were there people there five o'clock in the morning?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: At that stage there no people around.

CHAIRPERSON: So there were no people?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes, no people at all.

CHAIRPERSON: And you knew this?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No usually shop opened at five o'clock but when they stopped there, there weren't any people around.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, you got there first and you realised there were no people around?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes that is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: So you could not have been scared that people might get injured if once they get outside the car because there weren't any people around?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No Chairperson, there weren't any people there.

MR MADASA: Did you recover any ammunition from the vehicle of the suspects?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes there was ammunition found inside the car and there was also ammunition on the people themselves, on their persons.  9 mm bullets, 3 AK47 bullets, 765 mm bullets and inside the weapons there were also bullets, it was loaded and the 38 there were two shells which had been fired and two live rounds.  In the weapon of the person left at the back there was a bullet in the gun, it was cocked with a bullet in the barrel.

MR MADASA: Mr de Ru, the attempted arrest and the subsequent shooting on these people, how do you associate that with a political objective?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Chairperson, it was quite evident to me that these people were activists who set out to disrupt the government of the day, to incite violence and I believe that an investigation would have led to this as well.  I acted by arresting these people.  Like I've explained before it then happened that these people were actually shot dead instead of being arrested.  At that stage it was known that there were several attacks on policemen and that several policemen were killed.  I would also like to refer you to instructions from head office which is attached to the documents about how one should act with regards to attacks on police force members and I believed that my actions were in line with the instructions I received.  My motive was to suppress these people and it happened that they got killed.  I saw them as the enemy of the state.

MR MADASA: At that stage before the shooting did you have information if the gang was involved in the killings of police?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: I did yes.

MR MADASA: What information did you have?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: It was what Fouche told me, that they had already shot or killed six policemen.

MR MADASA: Did you believe that information?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: Yes I believed it.

MR MADASA: Did you find it necessary to investigate or did you take it on his word?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: I took his word for it.  I believed his word, your honour.

MR MADASA: You had some information that this gang could have been associated with the police, some police units, is that so?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: That is correct.

MR MADASA: What did you make of that, the fact that there were activists and probably associated with the police who were also employees of the state?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: It looked to me like third force activities.

MR MADASA: Is there anything that you benefitted as a result of the shooting of these gang members?  Did you benefit anything personally?

JACOBUS JOHANNES DE RU: No I didn't benefit.  I gained no personal benefit from it, no.

MR MADASA: Were you satisfied about the information that you received from De Lange as to the extent the involvement of these members or their training in guerilla activities at the time?