Photo for illustration only. (Photo: SA Police)
Hundreds of people were arrested in Cape Town this past Easter weekend for various legal offences, including drunk driving and assaulting a law enforcement officer.
Although the number of arrests (361) is more compared to last year’s (332) Easter weekend, fewer people were caught for drink driving.
JP Smith, Cape Town’s mayoral committee member for safety, says that compared to last year (89), there were nine fewer people arrested for drunk driving this past weekend.
In addition to the arrests, the metro’s law enforcement officers also issued more than 72,000 fines for various traffic violations. This is about 30,000 fewer fines than were issued during the same period last year.
Cape Town’s traffic officers made 84 arrests over the weekend, of which 67 people were arrested for drunk driving, five for reckless and negligent driving, and another 12 for, among other things, possession of a stolen car, forged documents and assaulting an officer.
The traffic police also arrested a motorist on the N7 on Sunday who had ten bags of marijuana of 4 kg each in his possession.
The traffic police recorded a total of 63,765 traffic violations, 231 public vehicles were seized and 1,451 warrants were obtained.
The traffic officers’ counterparts in the metro made a further 212 arrests during which more than 3,500 fines were issued.
The metro police, in turn, made 65 arrests, of which 13 were for drunk driving. The metro police also issued more than 5,000 fines for all kinds of legal offences.
The Cape Metro’s emergency communications center recorded almost 3 000 incidents over the Easter weekend. This compared to the more than 2,000 incidents recorded last year.
“Over the long weekend, our emergency services recorded an increase in assault cases, as well as motor vehicle accidents and noise complaints compared to last year’s Easter weekend,” says Smith.
| 2022 | 2023 | |
| Incidents of assault | 159 | 211 |
| Cases of domestic violence | 37 | 33 |
| Motor vehicle accidents | 37 | 54 |
| Pedestrian accident | 24 | 21 |
“Easter weekend is always a critical time from a law enforcement perspective, so I would like to thank members of the public who did not break the law,” he says.
“Often we focus on the actions of those who break the law, but we must also stop and thank those who respect the law and make the job easier for us.”
