AN Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police Department (EMPD) officer was arrested at the weekend in connection with the alleged theft of precious stones worth R14.9 million from a Killarney apartment in 2023, in the latest arrest to flow directly from testimony before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry.
Gauteng police swooped in Benoni, in an operation involving the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID), the Tactical Response Team and the Gauteng Response Team. The arrest follows explosive evidence given last month by an anonymous Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD) inspector, known only as Witness K, who told the commission she and suspended EMPD deputy chief Julius Mkhwanazi conspired with two of his subordinates to stage a fake police search-and-seizure operation to steal the stones.
Witness K, who testified partly in camera citing fears for her safety, said she had once been in a romantic relationship with Mkhwanazi and came forward to admit her own role in the scheme. She told the commission that on 11 February 2023 she met Mkhwanazi and EMPD officers Kesha-Leigh Stols and Aiden McKenzie, along with a civilian, Andy van der Walt, at a restaurant to finalise a plan to recover sugilite stones from a Killarney resident who lacked the required permits to possess them.
Stols, McKenzie, and Van der Walt then travelled to the apartment, where they seized the stones under the guise of a lawful police operation – using a falsified SAPS seizure form to make the theft appear legitimate. The stones, valued at nearly R15 million, were sold on the black market for a fraction of that amount: R110,000. The proceeds, Witness K testified, were split five ways at a car wash the following day, with each participant — including herself and Mkhwanazi — pocketing R22,000.
Mkhwanazi, who has denied any wrongdoing and insists the operation was a legitimate joint EMPD-JMPD exercise, was accused by commissioners of lying under oath after transcripts showed he had previously denied even knowing Witness K. Commissioner Sandile Khumalo told him bluntly that the absence of any paperwork, warrant or docket for the seizure meant the operation amounted, in effect, to an armed robbery carried out by officers in uniform.
The weekend arrest is the clearest sign yet that the precious stones case — one of the more startling threads to emerge from nine months of Madlanga Commission hearings — is moving from testimony to prosecution. It also adds EMPD’s rank and file to a rapidly lengthening roll call of police and metro officials facing arrest, suspension or dismissal as a direct consequence of evidence aired before Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga.
Mkhwanazi himself remains suspended and has separately been linked in commission evidence to an alleged R100,000 payment from tenderpreneur Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala’s companies, in exchange for authorising partnerships between EMPD and Matlala-linked businesses. He faces further scrutiny alongside city manager Kagiso Lerutla, both out on bail in a separate case involving an allegedly staged court impersonation.
For a commission established to root out criminal infiltration of South Africa’s police and justice system, the Killarney case has become a stark illustration of its central finding to date: that the rot runs from crime intelligence generals down to the metro cop on the beat, and that ordinary citizens have as much reason to fear a “lawful” search as an unlawful one.
All individuals named in this report face untested allegations before a commission of inquiry or in criminal proceedings before the courts, and are presumed innocent unless and until convicted. The Madlanga Commission continues to sit, with further testimony expected in the days ahead.
