Why you can’t drive away from the cops anymore

The video showing police allegedly violently arresting a woman at a petrol station on Thursday night has prompted the Justice Project South Africa (JPSA) to withdraw its support for the “Blue Light Protocol”, a system it developed with the Road Traffic Management Corporation in 2013 that gave motorists who are pulled over by the traffic police an alternative to stopping in an unsafe area.

Instead, it allowed motorists to slow down, put on their hazards, indicating to the blue-light vehicle behind you to follow, and then calmly drive no faster than 40km/h to the nearest police station, or public space with CCTV coverage (typically a service station forecourt).

JPSA chair Howard Dembovsky said “overzealous law enforcement officials” who didn’t adhere to the protocol had led to the organisation’s withdrawal of support.

The “Blue Light Protocol” came about due to “blue light gangs” posing as law enforcement, which have “been committing violent crimes ranging from robbery, hijacking and kidnapping to rape and murder for many years”, according to Dembovsky.

“Despite this fact, numerous police and traffic officers are wholly insensitive to this issue and incorrectly believe that they are empowered by the law to abuse members of the public who try to protect themselves from violent crime,” he said.

“In some instances, people have been beaten up. In others, they have been shot at and even been killed by overzealous law enforcement officials.

“This cannot go on and if, as it appears to be, the Blue Light Protocol is contributing to this abuse, JPSA can no longer endorse it,” he added.

According to Dembovsky, the National Road Traffic Act requires a motorist to immediately stop for both traffic officers and police officers in uniform.

READ MORE: Video of woman ‘assaulted’ by metro cops in Centurion being investigated

In the place of the “Blue Light Protocol”, Dembovsky now advises that if motorists feel unsafe they “should immediately call 10111 to verify the authenticity of the police stopping them and prepare to flee if anything goes awry.

“Should it turn out that the individuals stopping a motorist are criminals posing as police, the motorist should, where possible, institute civil and criminal proceedings against the culprits and the police, the latter of whom are constitutionally obliged to protect them from criminality,” Dembovsky suggested.

“In this case, it is our view that the officers concerned should be prosecuted for assault, since it is clear that the woman was merely trying to guard against falling victim to violent crime and was not fleeing from police,” he concluded.

Video footage, which surfaced on social media on Thursday night, showed Tshwane metro police pulling and pushing a woman around after she seemingly tried to make use of the protocol.

Social media posts claim the woman had been driving alone in the dark and was afraid to pull over.

She proceeded to a filling station where the altercation took place.

Metro police spokesperson Senior Superintendent Isaac Mahamba confirmed that an investigation into the incident was taking place.

The video can be watched here.

(Compiled by Daniel Friedman)

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