Woman assaulted, left with broken nose

An outing to town resulted in a nightmare for a woman and her husband when she was assaulted and robbed while her husband was in the store in Polokwane CBD, Review Online reports.

Suzette Prinsloo and her husband, Martin, went to a store on Schoeman Street, and she decided to wait in the car while her husband went into the store.

“I rolled down the window for some fresh air because it was extremely hot in the car,” she said.

She said a man came to the window and asked her for spare change, to which she answered she didn’t have any after which he left. A few minutes later, he returned to the car and tried to grab her cellphone lying on the dashboard.

“All I could think of was to try and stop him from grabbing my phone and seeing if I can close the window in time,” Suzette said.

“With the first hit I could feel the pain shooting up my nose. The second hit left me with eyes swollen shut and blood streaming down my face. After the assault the man ran away,” she explained.

After a few minutes she got the bleeding under control, and her husband came out of the store to find his wife covered in blood and badly traumatised.

READ MORE: Durban man brutally assaulted with pickaxe handle

“I found my wife in quite a state, she was bleeding and the car’s interior was covered in blood. When I asked her what happened she said a man robbed and assaulted her. I wanted to run down the street, find the guy and beat him up,” Martin said.

They went to a local medical facility, where Suzette was treated for a broken nose.

“There is no point in opening a case because where will the police find this man? They can’t even find murderers who have been on the run for years, how will they find this man? The worst of all is that the criminals know this as well,” said Martin.

Polokwane police spokesperson Warrant Officer Lesiba Ramoshaba said they were not aware of the cases referred to by Review, and this is largely due to people not reporting the matters to the police.

“The police cannot do something about an issue if they are unaware of what is happening. The only way we will know what is happening is when cases are opened and we can investigate them.

“This way police can plan to be proactive instead of only reacting after a crime has been committed,” he said.

He encouraged people to report any crimes to their nearest police station and said as a preventative measure police visibility will be doubled in the streets of the city’s central business district.

– Caxton News Service

For more news your way, follow The Citizen on Facebook and Twitter.