Client Testimonials

CHAOTIC CRIMINALS

Somewhere amid the scenic hills of Durban West a hijacker/robber is nursing at least one bullet wound after mistakenly being shot by his accomplice as their mini crime-spree came to a chaotic end. The saga began during lunch break at a building site in Gillitts when two armed men hijacked a Bandit-fitted Nissan diesel bakkie belonging to Electrical Projects of Overport, Durban. Once alerted, our Control Centre determined that the vehicle had driven towards Shongweni then crossed the freeway and was heading back east in the direction of Dassenhoek and Marianhill.

One of Bandit’s Private Recovery Teams was immediately despatched and within 90 minutes – by homing in on the tracking unit’s unique digital Beacon Transmitter signal – found the bakkie abandoned at the roadside in KwaNdengezi. Its blood-soaked interior, shattered glass and dented bodywork led to further enquiries which revealed that the hijackers had robbed a trading store and been surprised during their getaway by a cyclist who stopped and threw a brick through the bakkie’s side window. The hold-up men had responded with a hail of bullets, at least one of which unintentionally hit the driver who then crashed several times before the pair gave up on their motorised escape and completed it on foot. Mr Prem Inarman of Electrical Projects described Bandit’s performance as “excellent” and he thanked Control staff for keeping him appraised throughout the tracking and recovery process. 

FIVE HOURS OF TERROR

The two armed men lying in wait within a ‘secure’ Randburg complex must have rubbed their hands in criminal glee when they saw four women drive in, park their VW Polo and enter one of the luxury simplexes…leaving the front door wide open. Single mother Mrs Jacqueline Nunes, her daughter, step-daughter and niece –aged between 17 and 20 – found themselves being threatened with death before they had even finished putting down their handbags and switching on the lights. “I suppose we were foolish and not vigilant enough,” Mrs Nunes said afterwards, “but this was supposed to be a safe place to live.”

The home-invaders tied up their victims, took all their valuables and began systematically ransacking the abode, transferring their booty to Mrs Nunes’s car. Once satisfied - “sometime between 11 o’clock and midnight” - they locked the four women into a bedroom with the final warning that “if we screamed for help or tried to escape before they had safely made their getaway, they would come back and kill us all”. Mrs Nunes waited until she heard her Golf drive off before getting free of her ropes, untying the younger women and then climbing though an unbarred window to raise the alarm.

Due to a combination of “deep shock and policemen swarming all over my home”, it was after 9 a.m. when Mrs Nunes contacted Bandit. We simultaneously put ground and helicopter teams into action, ascertained GSM positioning coordinates from her car’s Activ tracking unit and soon found the Polo near O.R. Tambo International. After recovering from her ordeal, Mrs Nunes thanked “all Bandit personnel involved for keeping in touch with me throughout the tracking process and offering whatever assistance we might need…it was greatly appreciated by all of us who were so traumatised.”  

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

When an Annie’s Carriers MAN horse-and-trailer fitted with a Bandit FleetOne management/tracking system and carrying 34 tonnes of rice was hijacked in Mobeni, Durban, our 24-Hour Control was able to take two courses of action which soon led to a highly successful outcome. These were to activate the fugitive vehicle’s onboard digital Beacon Transmitter and to plot its GPS-derived live positioning data on the Bandit Website. 

The latter proved invaluable, for even though we found the hijacked combo just less than an hour later, its load of rice had already disappeared. By looking at the vehicle’s Trip History on our website, though, it could be seen exactly where a stop had been made, and that was where we found the cargo in a leased warehouse. SAPS staked out the venue and arrests were duly made. The owner of Annie’s Carriers, Mr Calvin Kippen, praised both Bandit’s response time and our technology – Trip History is a standard feature of ALL our Fleet Management Systems, including the FLEET-CONNECT joint venture with MTN.  

PISTOL-WIELDING PARTY-CRASHERS

A family birthday gathering in the back garden of a Kempton Park home turned unexpectedly nightmarish last month when guests found themselves being threatened and robbed at gunpoint by three armed men who gained access via the adjoining property.

“We all got the worst shocks of our lives”, said Mr Grant Damonse about the intruders’ sudden appearance at the festivities. “Eight family members  plus my wife and myself had been celebrating our son’s sixteenth birthday since about eight o’clock when almost exactly at the stroke of midnight it turned into a horror-show…just like one hears about in the news but thinks only happens to other people!”

The criminals herded their victims into the house, where each woman was forced to identify and empty her handbag as well as remove all jewellery, while the men had to turn out their pockets and add their wallets, cell-phones, watches and other valuables to the growing pile of booty. One of the home-invaders then made a quick run-through of the residence and returned with a laptop computer, portable CD player and more jewellery found in the master bedroom. Mr Damonse said afterwards that he had been especially anxious because the gunmen had made no attempt to disguise themselves. He had “read about cases where the victims are killed to prevent them from identifying their assailants…I was praying really hard that such a terrible fate wouldn’t befall my family”.

Fortunately it did not, and when the terrifying encounter came to an end just more than an hour later as the intruders drove off in both Mr Damonse’s private Chrysler and company Volkswagen cars, he was able to call Bandit and the police. Unlike many other such incidents, the criminals had not ripped out the home’s landline connection. Our 24-Hour Control activated the stolen vehicles’ digital beacon transmitters and saw from their positioning data that Thembisa seemed the most likely destination. With one Recovery Team aboard a Bandit helicopter and another racing towards the anticipated rendezvous point by road, the fleeing cars were soon pinpointed – entering Thembisa, just as had been deduced.

They came to a stop and their occupants unleashed several shots each at both the Bandit helicopter and ground vehicle, but our teams did not return fire as the fugitives had positioned themselves between domestic dwellings and thereby put innocent people at risk. Searching for the gunmen was undertaken by part of a SAPS contingent which duly arrived, while other members drove the recovered vehicles to the Thembisa police station for fingerprinting. At last check the investigation was “ongoing and progressing”.

According to Mr Damonse, Bandit’s performance during and after the saga was “the absolute best…the Controller kept in touch with me throughout the chase, while the teams were being shot at and then to say that my cars had been recovered.” “I also really appreciated the call two days later to see if the police had returned my cars and then checking to make sure that the tracking systems were still working properly…I wouldn’t change tracking companies for the world.”

AMBUSH AFTERMATH

On behalf of the members of Marltons Pets & Products, in specific Mr Gavin Marlton and Mr Devin Reddy, driver and owner of the hijacked vehicle, we would like to thank Bandit and in specific the recovery team for the successful recovery of Mr Reddy’s vehicle.
 
Thank you for your speedy response to our call, your continued feedback during the recovery process, the efficient and professional way the whole situation was handled. 
 
Again a big thank you from outside for which could have been such a tragic incident to ended with many gratitudes.
 
Kind Regards
 
Rolene van der Westhuizen
HR Officer
On behalf of Marltons Pets & Products

The above was in response to an incident in the Ballito area north of Durban at the end of last month when Mr Reddy was ambushed by armed men while making deliveries along the North Coast. One of the gang shot Mr Reddy in the leg when he offered resistance, then dragged him from his vehicle and dumped him at the side of the road before driving off in his Toyota Tazz.

The victim managed to attract the attention of a passing motorist who contacted both Bandit and SAPS before taking Mr Reddy to a medical centre. Bandit Control activated the fleeing Toyota’s onboard digital Beacon Transmitter and within an hour had tracked it to the middle of a sugarcane field. There was no sign of the hijackers, but it assumed that they had followed the common practice of abandoning the vehicle and then watching from a safe distance to see if a tracking company arrives on the scene. Mr Reddy’s vehicle was taken to the nearest police station to be collected by a family member once the SAPS Fingerprint Squad had completed its task.

Bandit management and staff thank Marltons for the expression of gratitude and extend to all Bandit clients the assurance that our manifesto includes delivering service of this high level on all possible occasions.

BULLETS FLY, SUSPECTS WOUNDED IN HIGH-SPEED FREEWAY CHASE

Morning rush-hour commuters on the outbound lanes of Durban’s busy Southern Freeway found themselves in harm’s way when criminals aboard a hijacked mini-bus opened fire on a Bandit Recovery Team and Metro Police vehicle which were giving chase. Fortunately, none of the pursuers nor any motorists were injured by the hail of bullets, but the hijackers came to an end which they had most likely not anticipated.

The drama began at 6 a.m. in the Nsuze police district outside Tongaat north of Durban when a Bandit-fitted VW mini-bus of the Mseleku Taxi Company was waylaid by three armed men. It’s driver was robbed of his money and cell-phone and then dumped in the sugarcane fields, so more than an hour elapsed before he made his way back to the office and reported the incident. Mr Mseleku immediately contacted Bandit Control which saw from the GSM coordinates being transmitted by the installed tracking unit that the mini-bus had during the ‘lost’ hour been driven to Durban and was currently passing through Springfield Park industrial area. Bandit activated the unit’s onboard Beacon Transmitter which emits a unique signature for final pinpointing by Recovery Teams and put both air and ground crews on high alert.

The next positioning of the fugitive taxi showed it to be travelling along Umgeni Road, which indicated that the hijackers were headed downtown. As this could still have led to a number of destinations amid heavy morning traffic, the cat-and-mouse game continued a while longer until the screens at Bandit Control revealed that the mini-bus had traversed the city centre and was being driven south along the Victoria Embankment. Certain that its quarry was now about to enter the Southern Freeway, a Bandit Recovery Team stationed itself at the Jacobs/Quality Street exit and waited as the signals from the taxi’s tracking unit Beacon Transmitter grew steadily louder.

Within a few minutes the hijacked mini-bus duly sped by as anticipated, its occupants still unaware of the forces at work against them as Bandit pulled out into the traffic flow and began following. The fugitive vehicle was travelling at high speed, and when it overtook a Metro Police Special Investigation Unit vehicle driven by Constable Chris White – who noticed that Bandit was following close behind – he signalled his intention to join the chase.

With several freeway exits now looming, Constable White moved in behind the mini-bus and switched on his siren and flashing lights, prompting the taxi’s front-seat passenger to lean from his window and unleash a hail of bullets from what appeared to be a 9 mm pistol. Fearing for the safety of motorists who were “clearly in a bit of a panic”, the Metro officer did not return fire from his trailing position but moved up alongside the fugitive vehicle – while bullets continued to fly in his direction – and shot the gunman in the head. He fell forward onto the dashboard, only for a third man to climb on to his accomplice’s slumped body from the rear of the mini-bus, retrieve the fallen pistol and continue firing.

Constable White dropped back into the trailing position as the taxi followed the airport-bound lanes then suddenly veered into oncoming traffic and headed contra-flow towards Isipingo. The Metro officer said afterwards that “cars were taking evasive action all over the place, just as in the movies…how there wasn’t a major pile-up I’ll never know!” The gun battle was put on hold as fleeing and pursuing vehicles weaved their way through one potential head-on collision after another, but resumed with added intensity from both sides once the relatively empty old main road at Isipingo was reached.

This leg of the chase turned out to be short-lived and the last, as just after passing through Lotus Park and another salvo of bullets from Constable White, the mini-bus went out of control and left the road, coming to a final, crashing halt in the sand dunes. As they parked their vehicles on the verge and set off on foot, the Metro officer and Bandit Recovery Team saw two men flee from the wreckage and head into the undergrowth. In the mini-bus they found the first gunman that Constable White had shot through the passenger window, still alive and with a bullet lodged in his head.

It was deduced from blood patterns inside the crashed vehicle that at least one, if not both, of the other two hijackers had also been shot during the chase. The pistol was nowhere to be seen and so assumed to be in the possession of the fleeing men. SAPS was contacted and a helicopter search quickly mounted, while Netcare dispatched an emergency vehicle to the scene to remove the wounded suspect to hospital. He died soon after being admitted, and although the initial hunt for his accomplices proved fruitless, a police patrol later that night arrested two men who had entered a local community clinic seeking treatment for gunshot wounds.

Taxi owner Mr Mseleku said that although it might seem callous and inhumane, he was glad that all three hijackers had been shot and one killed, because “these people have no respect for other people’s lives…and there are many hundreds of them who every day act outside of the law which seems powerless to do anything!” Mr Mseleku thanked Bandit for keeping him appraised as the drama unfolded and our Recovery Team for putting the return of his property before their own safety. He asked us to convey his special appreciation to Constable White of the Durban Metro Police for “stepping so bravely into the line of fire on my behalf!”

BANDIT TAKES THE EDGE OFF A TERRIFYING ENCOUNTER

When three armed men scaled down the front of a small residential block in Morningside, Durban, under the cover of darkness and gained entrance to one of the apartments via an unlocked security gate, they found Paul Jude sitting in his favourite chair and watching television. “My wife was due home any minute,” Mr Jude said afterwards, “so I had unlocked the sliding gate in case she was carrying parcels…when I heard it open and turned around to welcome her home, a gun in my face was more of a shock than you can imagine!”

As is common practice, the intruders demanded to know the location of their victim’s safe and gun: Mr Jude was pistol-whipped, stabbed in the forehead and throttled underfoot before the robbers were satisfied that he was telling the truth about not having either. They then dragged a profusely bleeding Mr Jude from room to room while ransacking and randomly vandalising his home. “I was all the while frantically praying that my wife was somehow being delayed and would not walk unsuspectingly into this nightmare…which turned out to be the case and for which I am eternally thankful!”

By the time Mrs Jude returned home 40 minutes later than originally expected, the gang had driven off in her husband’s VW Jetta loaded with audio-visual equipment and clothing. They had also stolen all her  jewellery as well as Mr Jude’s cell-phone and wallet. Describing what she saw on arriving at the apartment, Mrs Jude said that “it looked like a scene from CSI – total chaos with blood everywhere”. “Paul had staggered out of the apartment,” she continued, “banged on the door of our neighbour – who hadn’t heard a single sound of the attack – and from his flat called the police and Bandit.”

After immediately polling the Activ tracking unit in Mr Jude’s car and seeing that it was headed west, our 24-Hour Control staff triggered the system’s onboard low-frequency digital  Beacon Transmitter and dispatched a ground-based Recovery Team. The Jetta was found and handed over to the SAPS Fingerprint Division within ninety minutes, but that was not the main why Mrs Jude awarded Bandit “twenty points out of ten”. She said it was the “wonderful, caring and compassionate manner of every Bandit staff member that we dealt with…I don’t have the words to describe how they comforted us through the aftermath of Paul’s ordeal, but I can say that we were so fortunate to have Bandit at our sides.” 

A DARKER SHADE

When an armed gang held up the House of Paints outlet in Umgeni Road, Durban, they not only cleared out the cash register and robbed all those present of their money, jewellery and cell-phones, but also made their getaway in the branch’s Toyota Run-X. This was apparently part of a slightly elaborate plan, for when a Bandit Recovery Team found the stolen vehicle barely 15 minutes later it was just half a dozen blocks from the crime scene. Eyewitnesses told police that three men had abandoned the Run-X, got into a trailing BMW and driven off at high speed.

Chemical Specialties/House of Paints fleet controller Rob Abel rated Bandit’s performance and the Activ tracking unit as “one hundred percent…just as we’re used to”. He added that because the company has scores of vehicles at numerous centres around the country, it means “a greater likelihood of falling victim to thieves and hijackers…Bandit’s Recovery Teams are always on the ball and vehicle positioning from the control room has consistently been right on target”. 

SATISFIED CHANGE FOR THE BETTER

Simon Cohen of Johannesburg was the client of a rival, larger tracking company late last year when his SUV was stolen – and immediately reported to that company’s control room – during a five minute stop-off at a Sandton address. By the time police found the vehicle in Cape Town, however, Mr Cohen had already been paid out by his insurance company and purchased a replacement Mitsubishi double-cab 4x4.

Based on word-of-mouth recommendations he switched to Bandit for the new vehicle and opted for our High Alert system – a wise choice, it turned out, as last month the Mitsubishi was stolen in an identical repeat of the earlier scenario, except on this occasion Bandit Control had received a Static Theft message from the installed unit and was phoning Mr Cohen for confirmation just as he was experiencing that sinking feeling of walking out to discover an empty parking space! The Mitsubishi was tracked, recovered and returned to Mr Cohen within 90 minutes, prompting him to express “relief and great satisfaction that Bandit – unlike the previous tracking company I had relied upon - actually lived up to its claims”.

REAR-VIEW MIRROR ALERT!

When after a day at the office Deon Grobler drove his Audi A3 up to the manually-operated entrance to his Pinetown property he hadn’t noticed that a car was following him – until he got out to open the gates and it pulled in behind him. Three gun-wielding men leapt out, grabbed Mr Grobler’s wallet and then tried to bundle him back into the Audi. He managed to break free, though, vaulted the gates and ran towards his house, with one of the hijackers giving chase until the family dogs started barking.

Bandit was called and from the Activ unit’s positioning data it was clear that the Audi was heading for nearby Marianhill – which that evening happened to be the focus of a large-scale SAPS anti-crime operation. It is assumed that the hijackers soon encountered this because the stolen car’s journey came to a sudden halt and Bandit Control passed on its coordinates to police. They maintained vigil over the abandoned Audi while one of our Recovery Teams diverted from the chase to fetch Mr Grobler so that he could identify it. He said later that Bandit’s response was “very good indeed, and the controller phoned every ten minutes to keep me appraised of the unfolding situation, which was most reassuring and much appreciated”. Commenting on the fact that he had not realised that he was being followed, Mr Grobler said that “heightened vigilance” would be his watchword in the future.

ILLEGAL MEALS-ON-WHEELS!

The trade in stolen provisions around Richards Bay took a hit last month when we tracked and recovered seven tonnes of assorted groceries aboard an articulated vehicle driven from Durban under the cover of darkness. In the process our Recovery Team came upon the alleged perpetrators transferring their bounty to a line of waiting bakkies for distribution to illegal ‘shops’ in the area.

The theft had been discovered at Supergold Logistics in Durban South just before dawn that morning when management was made aware that the Mercedes ‘horse and trailer’ loaded overnight and scheduled for a Zululand run was no longer in the depot. As the vehicle is fitted with an Internet-based Bandit Executive system – which has True Satellite Tracking – our client, Mr Avesh Jagdaw, immediately logged on to the Bandit Website and within seconds saw that his missing asset was actually parked with its engine switched off in Mzingazi on the outskirts of Richards Bay. As this was clearly not where it should have been he contacted Bandit 24-Hour Control which activated the installed tracking unit’s Digital Beacon Transmitter and alerted our Recovery Team based in the area.

Armed with the four-metre accuracy satellite coordinates and homing in on the unique low-frequency signature signals being emitted by the unit, Recovery Team members were on the scene within minutes – finding the stolen vehicle being offloaded in a kraal. Suspects fled in all directions, but one man was apprehended on the spot and proved to be most forthcoming with information which led to his alleged accomplices being taken into custody by mid-afternoon. All of the stolen goods were duly recovered and the suspects handed over to police who, based on the expected outcome of further questioning, are expected to make further arrests and initiate a major crackdown on local traders dealing in stolen groceries.

Mr Jagdaw said at the conclusion of the saga that he “took his hat off to Bandit” for the swiftness and efficiency with which the operation was handled, adding that he had “never before used the Bandit Website application in quite this way and with such urgency…it was most reassuring to see just how accurate the positioning is and how useful the vehicle status data can prove to be”. 

THEFTS-IN-PROGRESS THWARTED

The effectiveness of Bandit tracking systems being able to ‘talk back’ to our national 24-Hour Control Centre via the extensive MTN network was shown yet again last month in two separate yet almost identical incidents at opposite ends of the country. Both involved Battery Disconnect – tampering with the vehicle’s power source which our systems are able to detect and then transmit an alert notification – and both happened in the middle of the night.

The first involved newly-wed couple Rob and Melissa Neethling of Durban who were three weeks into their honeymoon dream of exploring South Africa’s coastline in their Toyota Landcruiser. Having left Cape Town at dawn on the day concerned and heading up the West Coast, the couple decided to overnight at a B ‘n’ B in the Saldana Bay area. Their holiday mood was interrupted at about 1 a.m. when Bandit Control called Mr Neethling on his cell-phone to say that a Battery Disconnect alert had been received.

On exiting the building he heard the sound of running footsteps but caught no sight of anyone. As he soon discovered, his vehicle’s battery had in fact been disconnected and the would-be thieves had in their haste to escape left behind several implements of their trade. These were handed over to police who were immediately notified and arrived to take fingerprints once daylight had returned. Mr Neethling said afterwards that the Battery Disconnect alert had “proved Bandit’s advertising to be true, and even though my Landcruiser was slightly damaged during the attempted theft, the incident certainly proves that the technology works and that Bandit’s 24-Hour Control people are on the ball!”

Those were also the sentiments expressed by Peter Ackerman of Pietermaritzburg, who received his Battery Disconnect call from Bandit Control at around midnight while attending a family reunion in the Wonderboom area north of Pretoria. Due to the number of visitors, Mr Ackerman’s VW Jetta was among several vehicles parked on the front lawn, but his was closest to the property entrance. In this instance, too, the criminals got away – tipped off by the noise of guests rushing outside to investigate – but once again our client was “immensely relieved that Bandit technology actually worked when put to the test…this was my first encounter with car thieves and while I could have done without having to get my bonnet repaired the following day, at least the gang didn’t have the pleasure of making off with my car…thanks to Bandit!” 

INTO THE BREECH

Bandit Recoveries Manager Jan Meiring and Bandit Direct sales rep Jannie Els threw themselves into the unaccustomed role of ‘field operatives’ recently when a business premises in the vicinity of our HQ was invaded by three armed men who made their getaway by stealing a company vehicle. Coincidentally, Jan had just twenty minutes earlier seen what turned out to be the criminals as they were poised to strike at their target: “I was waiting behind two or three other cars at a stop street on my way to work,” he recounted after the incident, “and I noticed these guys standing near the entrance to Jonesco Trailers, which is one of our clients, and there was something about them that made me draw my firearm…I felt that perhaps a hijacking was imminent.” Even though nothing happened at the stop street, Jan could not shake his feeling of unease and told the shift on duty at our 24-Hour Control Room about it as soon as he arrived.

And just as our Recoveries Manager was going into the Bandit Website to check on the status of Jonesco’s vehicles, a distress call came through from the trailer manufacturer saying that a robbery had taken place and the company’s silver Corsa bakkie stolen. Jan saw online that it was stationary with engine switched off just a few kilometres away and – as he had been ‘involved’ from the start and the vehicle was nearby – grabbed a Recovery Pack to pinpoint the installed Bandit unit’s low-frequency digital signal and headed off with sales representative Jannie Els, who had also just arrived at work to be swept up in the excitement. Within minutes they had found the abandoned bakkie and handed over the incident to a ‘real’ Bandit Recovery Team which had also been alerted.

The latter, in turn, waited for client Sean Jones who later detailed what transpired in the half hour between – unbeknown to all concerned - Jan Meiring witnessing the gang about to launch its attack and then locating the stolen getaway vehicle. “They stormed in with guns brandished and pistol-whipped me to show they meant business,” said a still shaken Mr Jones, “then rounded up the clerical and sales people, after which workshop staff members were informed of the robbery in progress and told that they would not be harmed as long as they did not try to help us…some kind of Robin Hood gesture it would seem.”  Mr Jones, his office personnel and a visiting client were systematically relieved of all their money and valuables before the gang drove off in a company Corsa.

“Bandit’s performance and commitment were excellent,” he declared, “guarding the vehicle while I fetched spare keys, escorting me to have the vehicle fingerprinted and then accompanying me to have my injuries treated. At the time I wasn’t aware of what Messrs Meiring and Els had done, but I’d like to thank them now…they put themselves in harm’s way to ensure that our company bakkie was recovered as soon as possible, and that’s really admirable!” 

WE HELP SAPS CATCH HIJACKERS

When an elderly client phoned our 24-Hour Control to say that she and her husband had been hijacked from their Three Rivers East home – and that he had seemingly been taken along as there was no sign of him anywhere – we immediately polled the vehicle’s Activ tracking unit and passed on its positioning coordinates to the SAPS while simultaneously dispatching our nearest Recovery Team to the scene.

Within fifteen minutes the fugitive car had been stopped by the Flying Squad at the De Deur 4-way intersection and two armed suspects arrested after a chase on foot. Our client’s husband was found sitting in the car, shaken but unhurt. The couple, who asked to remain anonymous, thanked Bandit for the crucial part played in the “happy ending to their nightmare”, while a SAPS Inspector also praised Bandit for giving his team a head-start through the use of our advanced technology. 

BLACK SPOT STRIKES AGAIN

The steady stream of warnings from SAPS and private security experts to be especially vigilant at the entrance to one’s property proved valid yet again when two Mobeni Heights men in a company vehicle were hijacked at gunpoint as they were leaving home for their place of employment in Prospecton, Durban South. The two had worked overtime at industrial recycling merchants Reclamation Group the previous night and been loaned a company Toyota Hilux so that they could be back at the plant in time for the early morning shift.

As they were driving out of their shared residence’s gates, two gun-wielding men leapt into their path then ordered them to stop and run for their lives. Fearing that the incident might yet escalate into a home invasion the two victims hid a short distance away until the hijackers had driven off and turned into the next street. They then went back inside their house and telephoned their employer’s Operations Manager, Mr Kishore Bridgmohan, who in turn called Bandit Control.

The Hilux’s Activ tracking unit showed that the vehicle was in the Umlazi area of Durban South, and with the system’s low-frequency Beacon Transmitter activated it was less than 20 minutes before a Bandit Ground Recovery Team had the bakkie in their sights. The criminals spotted their pursuers at the same time, however, immediately abandoning their booty and fleeing into a maze of informal housing. A SAPS Dog Unit arrived shortly thereafter but was unable to successfully follow the scent.

Reclamation Group’s Mr Bridgmohan said later that Bandit had shown “really excellent response time and amazing accuracy with the Beacon Transmitter and how the Recovery Team was able to pinpoint my vehicle – I would recommend Bandit to anyone, especially with so much vehicle crime being perpetrated”. 

MORE PROOF OF THE PUDDING

A key member of the Bandit brains-trust recently had the surprise opportunity to experience first-hand the efficacy of both his high-tech innovations and our tracking and recovery expertise. Johan Oosthuisen, who plays an integral part in Bandit’s GSM and satellite-based research and development programme, was building a house in Midrand which involved hiring day-labour from a popular gathering point. Johan’s Ford Ranger 2.5 T/D soon became a regular sight there and all went smoothly until the morning when it was hijacked at knifepoint.

Within a few seconds of being contacted, Bandit 24-Hour Control positioned the vehicle via the GSM coordinates enabled by its Activ system. Final pinpointing and recovery was then accomplished by a combination of specially equipped helicopter-borne and ground-based Bandit Private Recovery Teams homing in on the tracking unit’s low-frequency Beacon Transmitter. After reclaiming his undamaged vehicle just a couple of hours later, Johan said that “although I may seem biased towards Bandit because of my relationship with the company, this was my debut frontline experience of a system which I helped to develop and I must say that I was very impressed!”

 Bandit reacted immediately and before half an hour had elapsed the bakkie was pinpointed, recovered and returned undamaged to it owners – a repeat of what happened in 2005 when a Maxim Safeguard vehicle was held up and hijacked by six armed men along the R562. Commenting on the double success, general manager Mrs Hyla Stewart described the performance of Bandit’s tracking technology and recovery personnel as “excellent…really excellent”. Every Maxim Safeguard vehicle is fitted with our Activ model and, according to Mrs Stewart, “every new vehicle that the company buys will have a Bandit installation – I would recommend it to anyone”.
 

COLD CARGO, HOT TRAIL

Owner/director of Pinetown-based frozen foods warehousing and distribution company Changing Tides, Alf Boardman, describes the top-end Bandit FleetMax systems installed in his trucks as “spot-on” and our Private Recovery Teams with their final pinpointing equipment as  “very sharp”. His experience began at half past eight one night when a guard phoned from his business premises with alarming news: all staff on duty – including security personnel – had just escaped after being rounded up at gunpoint and locked in a company vehicle’s cargo space for a few hours. They were sure that another truck had been stolen.

Mr Boardman logged in to the Fleet Management section of Bandit’s secure website and duly discovered – via the live, true satellite tracking in FleetMax – that one of his vehicles was on the move in a no-go area on the outskirts of Pinetown. The positioning to within 4-metre accuracy was confirmed by Bandit Control, a Recovery Team was despatched and the Changing Tides truck was back in its yard by one o’clock in the morning.
 

UNWELCOME HEART-RATE

Mr Rodney Ross-Munro is an early-morning regular at the busy Kloof gym near where he lives. The last thing he was expecting was for his 6 am workout to turn into a nightmare, but “the sense that something was wrong came over me when I had just exited the car and out the corner of my eye spotted two suspicious-looking guys coming toward me”. Mr Ross-Munro was forced at gunpoint and under repeated threats of death to hand over the keys to his Audi A4, along with his gold watch and neck-chain.

Staff members inside the gym helped the shocked victim recover from his ordeal while Bandit pinpointed the Activ unit’s digital signals, recovered the car about 10 minutes’ drive away from where it had been stolen and returned it unscathed to Mr Ross-Munro within an hour and a half of him being accosted. His response was to declare Bandit “absolutely fantastic – a system has been installed in another new car recently bought and I would most definitely recommend that all owners of top-end vehicles do the same”.
 

SAFER NOT TO KNOW

Employees hijacked while driving company vehicles are almost always asked if a tracking device is fitted: if the answer is yes they might well be taken along, at least until the hijackers believe they’ve made a clean getaway; if the answer is no, they are sometimes – but not always - ordered out of the vehicle and left unharmed at the roadside. The owner of Durban’s SDT Plumbers, Sydney Terblanche, says that it was based on this premise that he never told staff members about the Bandit Activ units in his small fleet. It is also why he believes that two of his workmen were spared a prolonged  and potentially more life- threatening ordeal.

They had completed a day’s work in the Umhlanga Rocks area and were returning to central Durban via North Coast Road when a carload of criminals blocked them off at a set of traffic lights. Two armed men forced their way into the SDT vehicle and, after being told that it was not fitted with a tracking device, drove off leaving the two shocked employees behind. Mr Terblanche received their distress call at about 8 pm and notified Bandit Control which, he says, “contacted me four times during the two-hour tracking episode…where my vehicle was heading and so forth…even to let me know that the Recovery Team had caught up with the hijackers and was coming under fire from them”. His vehicle back on SDT premises, Mr Terblanche said that he was “very, very impressed and spreading the word about Bandit’s outstanding performance”. 
 

EIGHTH TIME LUCKY

Mrs Deborah Hill of Durban awarded Bandit “two hundred gold stars” for tracking, recovering and returning her Activ-fitted Fiat Uno within two hours of it being stolen “from right under my nose” in the driveway while she was mowing the lawn. A stroke of good fortune was overdue for Mrs Hill: “This was the eighth car that I’ve had stolen and only the first that I’ve got back, although I have to confess that none of the others was fitted with a tracking system.” “I really am very glad that I chose Bandit for my first, though, because it turned out that they were brilliant and I tell everyone about them.”
 

THE RIGHT SWITCH

When the Nissan 1400 belonging to clearing and forwarding agents BLS Marine was stolen outside the customs depot at Durban harbour during a short stopover there, Peter Ashe immediately wondered if having switched to Bandit was going to prove worthwhile. On collecting his positioned, tracked, pinpointed and recovered bakkie from the southern outskirts of the city just two and a half hours later, Mr Ashe said he was “very impressed with the Activ system…Bandit’s performance was a hundred percent better than the company I’d used before”.
 

CONFIDENT UPGRADE

Management at Pretoria’s Kalinda Trading grew concerned when a company vehicle heading north along the R101 failed to make its scheduled call-in. The Mitsubishi Canter had to pass through a notorious ‘hot-spot’ en route to its destination, so when attempts to phone the driver on his mobile proved fruitless, Bandit Control was asked to position the vehicle. GSM-based coordinates transmitted from the Activ tracking unit showed it to be in the vicinity of a SANDF shooting range – far from the intended route – which led to the despatch of a Bandit Private Recovery Team along with support from the SAPS Tactical Intervention Unit as it was feared that the hijackers might be heavily armed.

With our team homing in on the Activ model’s low-frequency beacon transmitter signals and the police following close behind, the fugitive vehicle was soon being chased along an unmarked shooting range access road. The escape bid proved to be short-lived, however, and two suspects surrendered to the authorities without any shots being fired. Kalinda Trading’s driver and assistant were found in the vicinity a short while thereafter, unharmed but robbed of their cell-phones. Company owner/director Mr Wouter Roux was “so impressed by Bandit’s fantastic performance” that he has consequently upgraded to Fleet One in all seven Kalinda Trading vehicles: “In addition to self-monitoring them via the Internet, the instant No-Go Area and Vehicle Collision alerts along with Speed Limit Violations, Erratic Driving  and many other invaluable notifications will make me feel a lot more secure as well as reduce my fleet running costs.” 
 

DICING WITH DEATH

A Sandton woman who broke loose from armed hijackers and threw herself to the ground said after the terrifying incident that when the gang declared they were going to abduct her, she “decided in a split second that they might as well shoot me there and then”. Apparently taken aback by her reaction, the criminals pursued their threat no further.

Mrs Sharon Taverner and an employee had just exited the electronic gates of her property a little after 8 a.m. when the VW Sharan she was driving was blocked by a car containing four men. Two got out, approached the VW, drew their handguns and then ordered Mrs Taverner and her passenger from their vehicle. The employee was told to “Sleep!” – the new vernacular for ‘lie down with your eyes closed and we’ll leave you alone’ – while Mrs Taverner was robbed of her purse, cell-phone and jewellery. The attackers then said that she would be “coming along for insurance” and tried to bundle her back into the Sharan. It was at this point that Mrs Taverner opted to take her chances with death by wrestling free of them and flinging herself onto the grass verge.

Luckily, the gang did not react and merely drove off in their getaway car and the hijacked vehicle. Mrs Taverner telephoned her husband, who had left for work an hour earlier, and he was “so traumatised by the news” that he could not remember which tracking company to alert and so contacted his insurance broker, who reminded him that he had opted for Bandit. The Taverner’s broker offered to call our 24-Hour Control Centre on their behalf and within ten minutes their VW was tracked via its Activ unit and recovered. Mr Taverner later described Bandit’s performance as “outstanding…I was kept informed throughout the short chase and thereafter the Recovery Team took my vehicle to a body shop because the hijackers had badly scraped both sides while driving between lines of shacks…I would highly recommend Bandit!” 
 

CLIENT'S CAR PLUS ONE

When four men brandishing guns and knives stormed into the Westmead branch of Bearing Man they not only traumatised staff by robbing them of their money, jewellery and cell-phones, but also made off with the Branch Manager’s Toyota Corolla in addition to the company’s 2-litre VW Golf which was thought to have been the gang’s primary target. The latter was fitted with a Bandit Activ system while the former had no tracking device.

Within 90 minutes Bandit had tracked and recovered the VW not far from the industrial area of Pinetown where it had been stolen: as happens in many cases, suspicious-looking characters loitering in the vicinity of the abandoned vehicle quickly disappeared when we arrived on the scene. Our Recovery Team had been given a description of the Toyota, so they drove around the immediate vicinity and soon spotted it only a couple of streets away. Bearing Man Commercial Director Paul Forbes said that he had been “quite anxious” during the course of the tracking saga “but obviously very happy that Bandit was successful, and my Branch Manager can be especially thankful that our company fits Bandit tracking systems in its vehicles!”
 

FAKE SECURITY

When Mrs Truluck and her daughter drove into the parking area of a Westville pre-primary school to attend a morning function there, little did they know that the two seemingly-authentic car guards who directed them to an available space were in fact armed hijackers lying in wait. The truth dawned, though, as soon as the women climbed out of their Toyota Tazz and ‘security’ demanded the car keys at gunpoint.

Bandit Control positioned the fugitive vehicle via its Activ model’s GSM coordinates and a Recovery Team then followed the beacon transmitter’s low-frequency signals. The pursuit took a convoluted route through suburban New Germany before leading to a townhouse complex where the Tazz was abandoned and genuine security guards pointed out the direction in which the hijackers had fled on foot. Bandit personnel chased down and overpowered two suspects who were then handed over to police. Mrs Truluck was so impressed by “Bandit’s absolutely amazing, personalised and caring service…including an escort to the Westville police station for a suspect-identification parade” that she wrote to us thanking everyone from Control Room staff to the Recovery Team. 
 

NEVER HAPPENS IN CAPE TOWN?

Barely a month after relocating from Durban and moving into their new Rondebosch home, the Baldwin family of four fell victim to an armed gang which lay in wait inside the grounds and threatened their lives. Mr Lionel Baldwin, his wife and two children had been out for an early supper and after passing through their electric gates and approaching the house at about 9 pm were confronted by a gun-wielding man with three accomplices lurking behind him. The family was ordered out of the BMW 320i and pushed into a corner where the gang robbed them of their money, jewellery, keys and gate-remote before driving off in their car.

The intruder-hijackers closed the electric gates behind them, forcing Mr Baldwin to scale his property wall in order to summon help from a neighbour and giving the criminals a 10-minute head start in the process. Bandit was called, the stolen BMW’s GSM-positioning established via its Activ unit and one of our Recovery Teams put into action. Mr Baldwin said later - after a wry comment on “the perception that nothing like this ever happens in Cape Town” - that Bandit “did everything the company promises to do and more…I was given regular progress reports as they tracked my car towards the city and within two hours it was recovered undamaged in the Gardens area downtown and on its way back to me…a member of the team had driven to my home to collect a set of spare keys.” He added that “everything from response time to effectiveness and personalised client service was excellent…I would highly recommend Bandit to anyone”.