Pretoria - Convicted Facebook rapist Thabo Bester will not have the slightest chance to escape Kgosi Mampuru C-Max Prison at all.
The last person to do so was another convicted rapist and criminal “Houdini” Ananias Mathe in December 2006.
Bester will never emulate Mathe.
This was the confirmation of the National Commissioner of Correctional Services Makgothi Thobakgale in his reply to questions from the media in Cape Town this morning.
Thobakgale had joined the Minister of Police Bheki Cele, Minister of Justice and Correctional Services Ronald Lamola, Deputy Minister of Correctional Services Phathekile Holomisa and the National Commissioner of Police Fannie Masemola who were replying to questions from the media following the return of Bester and his girlfriend Dr Nandipha Magudumana to South Africa this morning.
The duo were arrested in Tanzania over the weekend along with a Mozambican national. Bester’s security took centre stage during the media conference with journalists concerned about security in his life following reports that he bribed his way out of the Mangaung Private Prison.
It was insinuated that some of his alleged accomplices might attempt to kill him to allegedly prevent him from “spilling the beans” about his escape or “walk-out” from prison in May last year.
But commissioner Thobakgale was adamant that his officer had drawn a security plan around his incarceration at the Kgosi Mampuru C-Max Section.
He said “Bester would be under 24/7 security and close monitoring by correctional services officers well-trained to deal with people such as Bester.”
Thobakgale said there were no reports of escapes from that prison in the recent past but conceded that Mathe had indeed escaped from such a facility but said that “was a long time ago.”
“The prison was upgraded in the past five years. He will never escape,” Thobakgale assured the media. Mathe escaped in December 2006 but the circumstances of his escape still remain sketchy despite some officials having been sacked from the services.
Bester and Magudumana landed at the Lanseria Airport this morning. Magudumana was immediately whisked away to Bloemfontein to appear at a local magistrate’s court charged with multiple counts of murder; violation of a bodies, defeating the ends of justice and fraud.
Bester like Mathe are both convicted rapists.
Mathe was kept at C-Max.
On April 30 2006 he tried to escape, but was unsuccessful. In November he did break out - by breaking the bars of his cell and then using cloth and hooks to get over the high wall of the prison.
Mathe's crime spree ended on December 4 2006 when he was traced driving a stolen car which had a tracker.
He had just robbed his last victim, Cameron Jeanne Meiklejohn, in her home in Craighall Park, Joburg.
Pretoria News