James Geldart shot by cops in 2008: still no trial…
20110528
“After crashing his car
trying to flee from an unmarked car with three black gunmen who did not
identify themselves as metro-cops, the Afrikaner high school boy played dead.
He woke up from a coma days later in hospital: with severe gunshot wounds and
facial injuries… “
On April 18 2008, James
Geldart, then the headboy at the Afrikaans High School Brandwag in Boksburg,
was accosted by a group of armed black men in a car and ordered to pull over.
He fled, terrified that the armed black men
inside the unmarked car may be hijackers. They were Boksburg metro-cops,
instead… but Geldart didn’t know that.
He crashed his car in his
haste to flee – and pretended to play dead. He woke up in hospital with
mysterious bullet wounds and severe facial injuries days later. The City Times
in Boksburg said in their article that he was in a coma for a few days.’ The
three unnamed metro-cops charged with his attempted murder have
managed to get the case postponed ever since. Their next court appearance is on
June 28 2011.
Case has dragged since April 18 2008 – and the cops are still working: packing guns:
Three as yet still
unnamed black Boksburg/Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police officers, charged with
the attempted murder of the young Afrikaner, have ever since then, managed to
get this case postponed
repeatedly. And again, on May 26 2011 they appeared in Benoni Regional Court –
still unnamed – and the case was once again postponed, this time to June 28.
The officers' lawyers said they had ‘approached the Director of Public
Prosecutions regarding the matter and were waiting to hear the outcome…’ the
court heard. The three officers have been charged with attempted murder, and
also with discharging a firearm in a built-up area and negligent use of a
firearm.
Shortly after the young,
unarmed, defenceless Afrikaner was shot inside his car under such inexplicable
circumstances, the Boksburg metropolitian police spokesman Wilfred Kgasago
assured the news media that: "The SAPS initiated investigations on the
matter. Investigations were in-depth and proved convoluted and protracted. The
sensitivity, as well as the gravity of the matter, debars the EMPD from commenting
at this juncture, as it does not wish to say anything that could have a bearing
on the case. Circumstances surrounding the case, as well as the stringent
procedures that had to be adhered to in the process of investigations,
necessitated that our internal investigations be put on hold until the courts
finalise the matter."
Geldart has since moved
to Durban. He
was interviewed by City Times in 2010 after yet another postponement. He said
at that time that he still bore the scars of that Friday morning attack."I
am happy that the matter is in court, it has been a while, so I am happy with
the news," he reportedly said “I have been going for examinations and
tests and need surgery for my facial injuries."
The three unnamed
Boksburg metro-cops first appeared in the Benoni Regional Court on Wednesday,
September 15 2010 – more than two years after Geldart was shot. And the case
has been dragging ever since – and these metrocops are still on duty, carrying
guns…
