By Everson Luhanga
Stolen surgical gloves were kept at the Hillbrow Police Station for a court exhibit before being stolen from the police station – again.
The police said the boxes of gloves are missing. No one knows how they were taken from the premises, because surveillance cameras have been installed at the facility and armed officers are guarding it.
The boxes of gloves were put into storage at the Hillbrow police station after a woman who worked at the Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital was arrested for allegedly delivering them to her private client, using a government vehicle.
The case went to the police.
Scrolla.Africa learned from sources that the day a security guard busted the suspect in November 2021 she allegedly tried to bribe him.
“The guard refused to take the R5,000 bribe and instead called the cops,” claimed a source.
A source working at the hospital told Scrolla.Africa that the suspect had worked as a cleaner in the department before the Covid-19 pandemic, but in 2020 was overseeing the distribution of personal protective equipment (PPE).
Gauteng police spokesperson Colonel Dimakatso Sello said that the matter of the alleged bribe and theft of PPE was investigated and brought before the court, but the case was withdrawn in April 2022.
The reason: the main suspect, the security guard who had blown the whistle, declined to come to court for consultations, according to National Prosecuting Authority regional spokesperson Phindi Mjonondwane. And now the evidence has disappeared.
Meanwhile, the hospital dismissed their employee, who appealed to the health MEC to reverse that decision. Hospital spokesperson Tabudi Madisha said they are awaiting the MEC’s response.
As for the hospital’s view, “After finding out that the suspect might be one of our employees, we instituted an internal investigation.
“The findings of the investigations recommended that the employee be charged with misconduct that includes theft and conniving and colluding.”
Pictured above: Boxes of the mysterious missing gloves
Image source: Supplied
