Angella Johnson
He is one of the country’s most wanted criminals. Prime candidate for Police Commissioner George Fivaz’s hit list of serious offenders to be rounded up. A fugitive being sought for extradition to Britain on murder charges.
But today Glen Chait (44) is a free man (albeit still on the run) following a remarkable encounter with the men from Brixton Murder and Robbery Squad, which has left the police empty-handed and red- faced.
It was late afternoon on Tuesday when Superintendent Willie Steyn and his fellow officers arrived at Doornrandjie Farm in Erasmia, Pretoria. They were looking for an unmarked plot where Chait’s girlfriend lived.
They were not expecting to find him there. The plan was to observe the house and plan a future stake- out. But just to be on the safe side, Steyn, as acting commander of the unit, had an arrest warrent tucked in his breast pocket along with a picture of the suspect.
The unmarked police car with some of Johannesburg’s best detectives cruised the area, frustrated in their effort to pinpoint the house. They spotted a man playing in his yard with a couple of dogs and decided to ask directions.
“Excuse me”, inquired Steyn politely on approaching a large gate. “Can you tell us where Glen Chait lives?”
Imagine his surprise when the smiling face introduced himself as Chait. The two men shook hands between the bars of the gate and Steyn reached inside his pocket, checked the colour photo and smartly whipped out his warrant.
“‘Fraid I’ll have to arrest you on suspicion of murder,” Steyn said, revealing not a flicker of the elation he must have been feeling to have caught his prey without even breaking into a sweat.
Chait appeared unruffled. He examined the photo. “Yes, that’s me,” he said matter-of-factly. He looked at the warrant to ensure its authenticity and then asked if it was possible to call his lawyer before leaving.
Delighted that his suspect was going to play ball, Steyn answered in the affirmative. “He was very calm and seemed to have accepted the situation,” Steyn said later.
Chait told the police that his dogs were vicious and would attack strangers. He said he would get his keys from inside the house and return to open the gate.
That was the last they saw of him. He went inside, out the back door and drove calmly away in his white bakkie — registration SJM 515T — which was parked at the back of the house.
“It did not cross my mind that he would run away,” said Steyn. “I feel a bit silly, but it was one of those things.”
He believes Chait may now be hiding out in Johannesburg before trying to leave the country.
Chait and another man, Neville van der Merwe (26), are being sought by Interpol in connection with the 1991 kidnapping and murder of chartered accountant Simon Law, at his home in Kent in Britain.
According to the Guardian in London, Law had dealings with a British-born South African-based businessman, David Jenkins, who ran Multistar Container Transport.
Just before his disappearance, Law had visited Jenkins in South Africa. Jenkins was facing serious financial problems and was under investigation by the South African police in connection with foreign currency dealings.
Law was interviewed at London’s Cumberland Hotel in October 1990 by Brigadier Mike Saayman, head of the commercial crime unit of the SAP, and bank investigator, Nico Alant. Saayman said that he was “just a witness”.
A week before Law’s disappearance, two South Africans arrived in Britain and lodged with a couple in Farnham, Surrey. It appears that they flew back to their homes in Pretoria and Johannesburg before Law’s disappearance had been noted.
The murder had been foreshadowed by Law’s remarks to neighbours that he feared someone from South Africa would come looking for him.
Van der Merwe’s whereabouts are unknown, but he is believed to have fled to America.