Thursday, December 19, 2019

Crimes of the South African Police Service


O’Sullivan to lay charges against police

Tuesday 14 February 2017 21:11
Sipho Stuurman



Paul O'Sullivan and his legal advisor Sarah Jane Trent speak to the media outside of court. (SABC)

Private investigator Paul O'Sullivan plans to lay more charges against police for the weekend arrest of his legal advisor, Sarah Jane Trent.

Trent appeared briefly in the Pretoria Magistrates’ Court where the matter was postponed until May 19.

This comes after O'Sullivan was himself arrested on Monday night. He was later released.

Trent faces charges of impersonating an Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) officer and fraud.

Police arrested her on Friday. She was released on R5000 bail on Sunday night.

She describes her arrest saying, "I was abducted. They came to the office on Friday afternoon at around  16:20. The warrant of arrest was issued on the Wednesday 08. But they waited for Friday and they then took me to a petrol station at Marlboro Drive and kept me for an hour and a half."

Following his own arrest on Monday night, O'Sullivan wants the police officers involved in both arrests to face the music.

He alleges that Acting National Police Commissioner, Kgomotso Phahlane, is behind the arrests.

"The charges will be abduction, defeating the ends of justice and racketeering and we say its racketeering, which carries a life sentence by the way. We say they are guilty of racketeering because they are unlawfully and intentionally doing what

they're doing to us to disrupt an investigation into a corrupt chief of police.

I know because I have seen the weight of evidence that I have been able to gather. That man will go to prison."

On Monday night, the High Court in Pretoria declared O'Sullivan's arrest unlawful.

In 2016, the court ruled that police must give O'Sullivan 48 hours' notice before detaining him.