- S v Davids and Others, High Court, Cape Town dated 31 October 2022 (WCC)

Four accused persons appeared in a summary trial before the High Court in Cape Town, charged with 11 charges. These charges are as follows:

(1) two counts of contravening section 9(1)(a) and section 9(2)(a) of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act 121 of 1998 (POCA);

(2) three counts of murder;

(3) three counts of unlawful possession of firearms;

(4) two counts of unlawful possession of ammunition; and

(5) one count of attempted murder.

The four accused persons are -

Accused 1: Dawnay Davids; accused 2: Mahlubandile Jacobs; accused 3: Moegamat Swarts; and accused 4: Vincent Davids.

The judgment by the High Court consists of a massive 150 paragraphs.

Accused 1, 2 and 4 were members of the "Ama Don't Care" and "28 vierde kamp" criminal gangs (see paragraphs [9], [26], [39], [40] and [52] (1) of the High Court judgment).

Accused 3 was not a member of any criminal gang (see para [52](e)).

During its judgment the High Court gave an informative interpretation of sections 9(1)(a) and 9(2)(a) of POCA, "common law common purpose, participant and accomplice". Accordingly, what follows is a summary of these issues supra.

The heading of Chapter 4 of POCA (sections 9 to 11) is "Offences relating to criminal gang activities". This Chapter 4 must, of course, be read together with the word definitions of "criminal gang" and "pattern of criminal gang activity" as referred to in section 1 of POCA. The said definitions are -

"Criminal gang" includes any formal or informal ongoing organisation, association or group of three or more persons, which has as one of its activities the commission of one or more criminal offences, which has an identifiable name or identifying sign or symbol and whose members individually or collectively engage in or have engaged in a pattern of criminal gang activity; and

"pattern of criminal gang activity" includes the commission of two or more criminal offences referred to in Schedule 1 [of POCA]: Provided that at least one of those offences occurred after the date of commencement of Chapter 4 and the last of those offences occurred within three years after a prior offence and the offences were committed -

(a) on separate occasions;

(b) on the same occasion, by two or more persons who are members of, or belong to, the same criminal gang.

(Emphasis added and words in square brackets inserted by Pollex.)

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[This is an extract of a short article published in Pollex in Servamus: April 2023. If you are interested in reading the rest of the discussion, send an e-mail to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or a WhatsApp or SMS message to: 078 712 1745 to find out what you need to do to acquire the article. Ed.]