Four murder accused referred to High Court

The Alexandra Magistrates’ Court transferred the cases of four men charged with murder, robbery, trespassing, possession of unlawful firearm and possession of unlawful ammunition to the Johannesburg High Court.

They will stand trial from 22 August to 2 September this year.

The accused, one of who was on bail for another robbery case committed in 2010 and still pending, were alleged to have committed the offences on the evening of 24 February this year in the Sandton area.

They allegedly shot and killed a man driving a Toyota Fortuner in which there were two other occupants. The suspects stopped the vehicle as the three men were leaving a club in River Club to go buy some food. Two of the accused allegedly approached the vehicle from the driver’s side and one of them shot the driver in the head while their two accomplices approached the passenger side and forced out the other two victims before robbing them of unknown personal items.

The accused then ran away after failing to start the vehicle. Two of them were arrested on private premises nearby by patrolling security guards, and the other two accused were arrested nearby by police on patrol.

The murder weapon with three live rounds was found on one of the accused and its ownership traced to a deceased uncle of one of the other accused. Some of the victim’s stolen items were also retrieved from the accused.

Inconclusive investigations by the guards also probed if the accused were involved in an earlier attempted house robbery near the murder scene which was thwarted when the alarm went off.