/ 23 June 2008

Cop, eight others, in court for ATM blasts

Nine men, including a police inspector, are expected to appear in the Randburg Magistrate’s Court on Monday in connection with ATM bombings in Gauteng, police said.

The inspector was an explosives sniffer-dog handler with the West Rand Dog Unit, Superintendent Eugene Opperman said on Sunday.

The group had already been linked to an ATM blast in Mondeor in March.

”Detectives are working around the clock to see whether this group was involved in other ATM blasts in Gauteng and perhaps even in other provinces.”

Police arrested three of the nine at a tavern in Soweto on Thursday evening. They had allegedly been involved in a house robbery in Florida, on Johannesburg’s West Rrand, earlier that day. Items stolen from the house were found in their possession. Police also confiscated the car stolen during the robbery.

”Investigators seized an amount of explosives and firearms during their investigations,” said Opperman.

These would be sent for ballistic and forensic tests to determine whether they had been used in other violent crimes. – Sapa