Ministers ordered to pay military cops R500,000 after 'humiliating' arrests

Two long-serving members of the Natal Mountain Rifles have successfully sued the ministers of defence and police for R200,000 each after they were arrested by military police at a shooting range and detained, in leg irons, for two days in police cells.

Commanding officer Lt-Col Michael Rowe — who resigned after the “humiliating” incident in 2017 — and Capt Nigel Lewis-Walker, who has subsequently retired, sought damages for their unlawful arrest and detention in November 2017.

Lewis-Walker’s son, Robert, who was 24 at the time and a member of the unit’s band, was arrested along with them. He was awarded R100,000 in damages.

Pietermaritzburg high court judge Piet Bezuidenhout also directed the ministers to pay them about R19,000 they spent on hiring a lawyer that weekend and the legal costs of their damages claim.

In his judgment, Bezuidenhout said it was difficult to establish who had given the instruction to arrest them and why they had been kept, in leg irons, in a police cell from Saturday to Monday morning, when they were taken to court where a prosecutor instructed they be released.

Their “crime”, according to one of the witnesses for the ministers, was that Robert Lewis-Walker had participated in the shooting exercise wearing a “camouflage” uniform — which he had borrowed from his father — without authorisation.

Rowe testified that he joined the unit in 1983 and had become commanding officer in 2005.

After their arrest at the shooting range in Merrivale, they were taken to the Bluff army base. There Rowe was asked to sign a document which had already been completed. It mentioned charges of “fraud and corruption”.

He and the Lewis-Walkers were allowed to go back to their homes to change into civilian clothing. He was then placed in a police van in full view of his neighbours. 

Later that night, they were locked in one cell at Brighton Beach police station. They were placed in leg-irons by a SAPS captain. 

Rowe said he had given permission for Robert Lewis-Walker to take part in the shooting exercise and “who was not just a normal civilian but a member of the unit”.

He said he even had authority to invite a civilian if he wished.

But lawyers for the ministers argued it was an offence for him to wear camouflage uniform “as it was government property” and he was not authorised to take part in the shoot.

In his assessment of the evidence, Bezuidenhout said Robert Lewis-Walker had been a drummer in the unit since 2010 and, like his father and Rowe, was well-known.

A military policeman, W/O Ngema, who was sent to the shooting range by a senior officer, had correctly conceded that “they were not going to run away and they were not a flight risk”.

It was not necessary to arrest them and he would have warned them to come to court on Monday.  

Under cross-examination, he had agreed that Rowe had been armed with a military pistol and it was not taken away from him when he was arrested.

Bezuidenhout said no evidence had been presented as to why — as members of society in good standing and officers of the unit — they were arrested and detained in police cells.

“Besides that they were incarcerated at Brighton Beach cells, which from the evidence were not in the best condition, it is further difficult to understand why they had to be shackled. It would appear that this was to humiliate them.

“Also, the placing of Rowe in the back of a police van at his home in sight of other people at the complex where he resided was unnecessary and humiliating.”

The judge said Rowe’s evidence that as unit commander he had the authority to allow Robert Lewis-Walker to participate in the shooting practice had not been challenged by the ministers.

He ruled that the arrests had been effected without a warrant and without justification and their detention was unlawful.

He said their treatment warranted the award of “substantial damages” — particularly as there had been no explanation from either minister on why they had been treated so badly.

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