Family comes first
FOR Atlas Security operations manager Monty Montgomery crime never rests, but he "does not let his job run his family”.
When Montgomery, 56, gets to his Providentia home after a long day of chasing criminals, he puts his gun and bullet proof vest away and shifts his focus to his wife Santa, 53, and their 18-year- old daughter, Anja.
Santa, a Grade 1 teacher and acting deputy principal at Young Park Primary, describes her husband as a family man who does not bring the stress from his job home with him.
Although he keeps his work radio on 24-hours a day, Montgomery has refined his ability to block out the general chatter and recognise when there is an emergency.
The only time he does not have his radio with him is when he is having supper with his family, or when they are on holiday.
The crime-fighter has been with the security company for 16 years and his family are concerned every time he goes out on the road.
"We worry,” said Santa, who recalled one night when he rushed out to a robbery. "We put Monty in God’s hands.”
Anja, a first year biomedical technology student at NMMU, is close to her father and keeps him in her thoughts at all times.
But the family takes comfort in the fact that Montgomery has good backup at work and they trust that the Atlas team keep each other safe.
He describes an unfortunate incident back in 1994 that nudged him towards the security industry.
"I owned a hardware store in the Eastern Transvaal and one day five armed robbers came in and robbed me at gun point. My brother and a friend were with me and there were a dozen customers, including two children, in the store.
"That triggered my want to protect people from this kind of thing,” said Monty who began his career at Atlas two years later.
Despite his high-pressure job, the Montgomery’s are a normal family who are sport mad and never miss an EP King’s game.
Santa and Monty love their neighbourhood and said that it is "virtually crime free”. The Atlas van parked in the driveway is probably a good deterrent.
"Our neighbours are glad they have Monty as a neighbour,” laughs Santa.
It is a quiet area, said Monty, but he jokes that it gets noisy when the cows come to visit.