In their continued campaign to mislead the public of their inability to control crime in this country, the police denied that they are facing a mountain to climb with an ever growing DNA backlog.
During a summit in Gauteng on Wednesday, the Deputy National Police Commissioner Shadrack Sibiya said that there is ‘no DNA backlog’ and that they have successfully been working to keep the system up to date. This a blatant lie in the face of indisputable evidence that the police are facing a mountain of DNA backlogs, a problem that leaves countless victims of violence without justice. Recently, a report from the Forensic Services Laboratory (FSL), which is a branch of the police, showed that the backlog currently stands at 140 000 outstanding cases.
“With this ridiculous statement, the police have made it clear that they couldn’t care less about victims of gender based violence. Not only are they denying reality, they are denying the trauma and pain that victims suffer every day. This will only further erode the almost non-existent trust that the people of South Africa have in the police,” said Action Society spokesperson, Juanita du Preez.
