Bait – to catch a killer
Janine Lazarus
NB Publishers
ISBN: 9781990973345
- Captain Ben Booysen was the senior investigating officer in the Krugersdorp murders on which the Showmax documentary Devilsdorp was based.
First of all I want to mention that the submissions as far as the investigation of the Norwood Killer is concerned are based on what I read in the book as I was not privy to the dockets in this regard.
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Upon reading the book and throughout reading the book the one issue that I sought substance for is the title of the book.
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Upon reading the book and throughout reading the book the one issue that I sought substance for is the title of the book. The title is based on one night that the author was used as “bait” and the fact that the Murder and Robbery Squad was using her apartment (flat) as some JOCC (joint operations command centre) during a period of their investigation. Unfortunately it is my submission that the author was just used by this squad and that nothing they were doing there ultimately led to the arrest of Geldenhuys. This is supported by the fact that the very morning after the author’s night on the street the squad moved out and nothing else transpired. If this had indeed been done to lure the suspect based on the modus operandi they would have stayed on to see if the suspect came to the flat after he noticed her on the street. Unfortunately the author did not recognise this for what it was.
It is also my view after reading this book that a more suitable title for the book would rather have been Queen of sleaze, my years as crime reporter. I could not find any positive indication in the book that whatever the author did with or without the Murder and Robbery Squad during 1992 actually contributed to the arrest of Geldenhuys. The story line of the book jumps in between the Norwood killer’s three scenes that took place in Norwood precinct and then randomly the career of the author during, before and after, and only at the end of the book the chapters which I would have thought should have covered the contents of the whole book appeared.
I am also not convinced that the author had an obsession with Geldenhuys. From the first chapter of the book it was clear that whatever the author did pertaining to the Norwood killer had been initiated and sparked by her conversation with her editor accusing her of dropping the ball on a serial killer case and that the author, being the dedicated journalist, had not taken kindly to this criticism and that is what drove her to do what she did. Thereafter each and every career decision she made was clearly based on her financial need because of her savings being depleted. If she was indeed infatuated and obsessed with Geldenhuys she would have followed his term in prison and kept tabs on him as I have seen in my career with many journalists. But instead, the only times her path ever crossed again with that of Geldenhuys was when she was called by someone informing her of his parole applications, and if this did not take place she would have proceeded on her path uninterrupted. A person with an obsession would have pursued his family (not turned away when she had the opportunity to meet with the mother of a serial killer), his colleagues (being a police official it would not have been difficult), his initial fiancé (especially taking into account that his demeanour was identified as that of a person who had difficulties in relationships), and so forth. Only in the end, when the author is given the task of researching Geldenhuys because of her previous interaction with him and the series they were working on, did she dig deeper into what made him what he was.
To compare her first meeting with Geldenhuys in the cells of the Supreme Court to the scene from Silence of the lambs is like comparing an episode of Big Fat Gypsy Weddings to the live broadcast of a royal wedding. It simply does not compare. I got the impression that the author was trying to augment her experience instead of just portraying what had happened there, for purposes unknown to me.
The image the author portrayed of herself in the book reminded me of a young careless individual who was having a lot of fun and was not at all prepared for the world of crime and what it held. She was not equipped to deal with the consequences of her actions participating in following the SAPS doing their work, and viewed it as an adventure similar to the BBC’s girl police programme which ultimately destroyed her life and manifested each time she came into contact with Geldenhuys. She was like the proverbial moth flying too close to the flame once too many times and got burned. I do not know if she realised that during the BBC programme the careers of a few very dedicated cops were destroyed when the management saw the unauthorised footage taken and it was aired on the BBC. This I know because my wife, being a police official, was personally involved in departmental hearings of those members, and their defence was that the female recorder had promised them that the camera would be off and she would report on what they had experienced only in writing, without any footage, not knowing the camera was never turned off. This I realised only when I was reading the book. Being a retired police officer after 42 years of service I can vouch for the fact that police work is very exciting and not one day is the same as the day before and not one crime scene is the same as the one before, even if it was committed by the same perpetrator, but it comes at a price which not many could afford.
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Being a retired police officer after 42 years of service I can vouch for the fact that police work is very exciting and not one day is the same as the day before and not one crime scene is the same as the one before, even if it was committed by the same perpetrator, but it comes at a price which not many could afford.
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As to the investigation conducted by the Murder and Robbery Squad, very little of which is mentioned in the book, my approach would have been to start with a process of elimination after it was realised that the suspect was possibly a police employee. For instance, each and every member who stayed in the barracks would have been working on a duty roster called the SAPS 15. If you take all the SAPS 15s of the dates of the incidents and compare them with who was on/off duty at the time of the incidents you would have narrowed them down to a specific relief or unit of which its member should have resided in the barracks. The stake-out at the author’s flat did not make sense to me, as what they did there firstly limited their point of view as to the area, and secondly, I did not read that there was any information that the suspect followed his victims into their flats and overpowered them soon after their arrival, and thus the bait they threw out also did not make sense. If the suspect was indeed staying in the barracks, surveillance of the windows of the barracks facing the street would have been more productive, especially during night times when whoever is at the barracks would have their lights on, or whoever is supposed to be home, being off duty, is not home because they are prowling the streets outside. A schematic of the barracks rooms would have told you exactly who is staying at which window, and then comparing it with the duty rosters would have given the investigating officer another picture and maybe then the methodology followed during the investigation would have been different. In addition to this, if the suspect was staying in the barracks and the crime scenes got so much attention in the newspaper as they mentioned, he would have realised they are on to him. By monitoring the comings and goings of the barracks and then all of a sudden this one police official moves out of the barracks after the third incident, if I was the investigating officer, my surveillance would have moved to the place this person is moving to and then maybe the last victim would not have died.
In another process of elimination the description of the height and build of the suspect incorrectly portrayed in the sketch might have also helped if the investigating officer had got all these particulars of the employees from HRM he had identified if he had done the on/off duty elimination process and this would also have narrowed the pool of possible suspects.
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Please note that no investigating officer follows the same route as another one, and my approach I have mentioned does not mean the investigators therefore did something wrong. It is rather that my methodology in identifying the suspect would have been different.
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Please note that no investigating officer follows the same route as another one, and my approach I have mentioned does not mean the investigators therefore did something wrong. It is rather that my methodology in identifying the suspect would have been different.
Overall the book might be exciting for a person not having the background I have, but unfortunately I was not impressed and my expectations were perhaps too high.
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