THE investigation into the tragic death of Siam Lee opened a veritable pandora’s box of drugs, prostitution and brothels from the seedy side of town to the “massage parlours” in upmarket suburbs.
Mobi Claw’s CEO, Mike Myers and chief operations officer, Paul Stone, (both Westville residents) shared some of their experiences in the “underworld” in the Point, Pickering and beachfront areas where they were following leads in an urgent quest to find Siam Lee.
“The dark side of life,” said Myers, “was an eye-opener and revealed a devious network of operators that included South Africans, foreign nationals such as Nigerians, the Chinese triads and Russians.
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“What Myers and Stone discovered is but the “tip of the iceberg. There are ongoing investigations, but people should realise this is a huge, global problem requiring global intervention.
“Myers and Stone stressed that while people may turn a blind eye and keep their blinkers on, the world of drugs and sex is insidious with active operations in the suburbs.
“Drugs are being delivered to homes in suburbs such as Westville, Durban North, Umhlanga, Ballito. There are many brothels in the upmarket leafy suburbs. There are also houses being used to manufacture drugs and many drug runners, masquerading as beggars, are enjoying a lucrative trade.
“And,” he said sternly, “we must remember, where there is demand, there will be supply.”
This has the makings of a book
“Paul and I worked the case solid for five days, pretty much 24/7, our car becoming our office, dining room and bedroom, the Sunday we worked 20 hours without a break. At times covering for each other while we took the off 10-minute power nap.
“Cases like this tend to bring in a number of leads and each lead needs to be followed and eliminated if it leads to a dead end. These leads are from family, friends, an informer network and others through social media.
“Two leads at the time seemed strong and there was little else to work on at the time, both leads coming in from an informer network. These leads took us into the Point, Pickering and the beachfront area, where our journey into the underworld began.
“We’ll start at the least sordid, the beachfront. The stretch from Addington Hospital to just past the Malibu, teaming with prostitutes of the worst kind, all races and ages,” said Myers.
Myers and Stone said they saw girls from about 15 to 50 years of all races.
Besides monitoring their comings and goings, we interviewed many. Now these are not your high class call girls, these are heroin and crack addicts, the symptoms thereof very evident with HIV and aids being more than likely rife.
Monitoring them uncovered just how society is either oblivious to them or has accepted them. We watched as regular people walked past them as if they never existed or were just part of society. We watched as their clients picked them up, some on foot, others in cars, also all races driving in fancy BMWs, Mercedes, and Audis etc.
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These women would go off with the client and return to ‘their’ spot within 15 minutes to an hour, not bathed or showered after a quick interlude in the
client’s car, waiting for the next ‘John’ and plenty of Johns there were.
Interviewing these women of the day and night was an eye opener. Oral pleasure costs R100, full house treatment an extra R50, scary stuff.
Next, they entered what could be likened to Sodom and Gomorrah in the Point, Pickering and Fisher areas where activities continue 24/7.
Here, they found people from all over West Africa and South Africans.
Drugs are rife, prostitution is rife, urban decay is rife. Our investigations took us into the buildings, some more decent than others, but none really decent at all. The first block we entered, each flat not much bigger than a parking bay, some with six to eight inhabitants.
Faeces, urine, syringes and needles on the floor, one person even lying passed out with a needle hanging out their arm. The inhabitants of this building had lost all sense of dignity and pride, they just existed.
At a more “upmarket block”, we were greeted by two receptionists that give a proper once over. A night here costs you R80. Some rooms are furnished, others are not.
At least an attempt is made to keep this block clean. Up the stairs we go to begin our search and interviews. We find what we’re looking for, the woman that everyone says is Siam, but it’s not. We can certainly see the similarity and why we have been led to her. For the purpose of this story we’ll call her Jane.
Sex, drugs: no rock n roll
Jane we estimate to be in her late 20s, in her own right very attractive, except for her teeth that have been rotted by drugs.
She very quickly softens up to us when she realises that we’re not there for her but searching for a missing girl and invites us into her flat.
This hard, streetwise girl, doesn’t pull any punches with her mouth and says is like it is. But we note little things, she has a cat, this cat loves her and won’t leave her alone and there is a bedraggled Christmas tree in the one corner.
You soon realise, this girl has a heart and somewhere deep down in there she is hurting and wanting for more, but the drugs have captured her soul.
We interview Jane in the hope of a lead to Siam and what is revealed from that interview is scary. It leads to insinuations of a human trafficking ring. We cannot divulge more in that regard at this stage.
This little part of society is purely sex and drugs; the rock and roll is missing.
In our plight to find Siam, we had put word out of a reward if someone successfully led us to Siam. This opened up a whole new avenue for revenue for the desperate and street people pointed out nightclubs that not many people know exist, saying she was there.
We entered these clubs, where amazingly there was some of the best jazz music you have ever heard, but that’s where it ended. Among the patrons of these clubs we would find the odd white female, none of them Siam, and it soon became obvious that in the hope of pointing out Siam in return for a reward, these street people were pointing out any white female prostitute they came across in the hope that it may be her.
Myers and Stone found during the time spent in this sordid area that the locals became quite tolerable of us and even cooperative. They said no aggression was shown towards them and even bouncers were helpful.
We put it down to two things, firstly that we were there looking for a missing girl, secondly that we were disturbing their trade and they wanted to see the back of us.
We think we have a break and get to meet another lady of the night, we’ll call her ‘Mary’. Mary happens to know Siam, not well, but does know her and has not seen her in a while. Mary is working the beachfront out of desperation but wants to get back onto operating in the suburbs.
This becomes our first step back into the suburbs, note our first link from the sordid underworld into the suburbs. Mary had heard a rumour that Siam could be working at a ‘lodge’ in the Morningside area.
We set it up with Mary where she will go into the ‘lodge’ to start working there and will look for Siam and if she is there, she will get a message to us.
While this lead went cold, and unknown to us, Siam had already been brutally murdered. We discover one brothel after the other in the upmarket suburbs.
The guys follow another lead from the dark and seedy world which leads them back to the suburbs, this time in Cowies Hill and Westville.
This is where the Nigerian drug cartels have firmly buried their roots, right here in the suburbs we live in. Not only the Nigerians, but a host of other foreign nationals have teamed up with them and, who we think are normal neighbours, are operating brothels and drug manufacturing plants in our upmarket suburbs.
When we talk drugs and brothels, we are also not just talking weed and high class escorts. We are talking cocaine, ecstasy, crack, heroin etc. These brothels house the most sordid adult entertainers, all races, female, male and ‘lady Boys’. For those into that lifestyle, the world is your oyster.
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Now before you jump up and down and blame the authorities and the police, there are a few things to consider:
• Every first world country in the world has these same slum, drug and prostitute infested areas.
• As a policeman in Johannesburg in the 80s we had Hillbrow, Bertrams and other area where we were already seeing this infestation.
Myers and Stone say if we want to clean out our suburbs we need to look at ourselves as a society and accept these are social issues which we have created.
We have chosen to either accept or turn a blind eye to what is happening around us, granted there are those with blinkers on that are totally oblivious to this.
If we want to stop this and protect our children, we have to cut the head of the snake. How do we do this, quite simply we need to stop supporting this underworld. This underworld is like any other business, it is driven by money.
The market in the suburbs have created the supply and demand and we would be very naïve to think that all our neighbours are the perfect parents and role models of society, even those that come across that way.
We ourselves have created this monster, we can’t expect others to fix it for us. I can assure you there are those reading this right now that are wondering about their own lifestyles and sordid recreational habits, chances are feeling very guilty too. If we want to fix this problem, is starts at home, then look at our families, friends and neighbours. Right within that small circle is where the problem is manifesting.
Stone said recently a beggar was arrested and found to be carrying and selling heroin.
Don’t support beggars by giving them money. Be observant. A house in the suburbs that has a high volume of traffic to and from it, is suspicious and could be a brothel. Houses where there are chemical deliveries, extractor fans and chemical smells might be housing a drug manufacturing plant.
Neighbourhood watches can do patrols and look out for these activities. Educate your children about the danger of drugs and where it can lead to because if the demand drops, so will the supply.
Thank you to all those that assisted us when the cards were down, each and everyone of you played a massive role.
All through the investigation people were begging for answers as to how they could prevent similar incidents happening to their children, well this should be a good read for those.
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