Truck hijack probe leads to discovery of mortar bomb
A 52-YEAR-old man was arrested on a charge of possessing a suspected hijacked truck and a mortar bomb after police searched his Dobsonville, Soweto shack yesterday afternoon.
Police spokesman Lieutenant Kay Makhubela said: “The Johannesburg Flying Squad recovered a mortar explosive and a suspected hijacked truck. Nothing was found inside the truck. The man was found in the house and was arrested.”
The suspect’s granddaughter, who does not want to be named, had retur ned from school when she saw police cars and dogs at her home.
The 20-year-old matric pupil said her family was shocked when police said her grandfather’s truck had been stolen, because he had had it for many years and used it to make deliveries in the township for a fee.
Her family of 10 lives in the main house and her grandfather stays in the backroom shack alone. Young boys in the township would sometimes help him with deliveries. But he’d always wash the truck on his own, she said.
For the past few months, since falling ill, he had not been doing his deliveries with the truck, the granddaughter said.
Neighbours were surprised to hear about the bomb and the truck: “He has been using his truck to help people in the township for as long as I can remember,” said a neighbour, Beverley Tsoai.
“We all know he’s sick. When he was being arrested he wasn’t able to take his medication. If he falls ill in the police cells we hope they’ll take him to the doctor,” she said.
Makhubela said the suspect would be charged with possession of an explosive and a suspected hijacked truck.
He is due to appear in the Protea Magistrate’s Court on Monday.