This is a recent Cape Times article which highlights the numbers of Serial Rapists in South Africa and the number SAPS guys tracking down these rapists. In a country where a woman or child is raped every 26 seconds, we need more people tackling these type of crimes, and once the DNA database is running effectively, it can be used as another powerful weapon in their arsenal.

Johannes Jacobus Steyn's first appearance in Krugersdorp Magistrate's Court, where he faces a number of rape and murder charges.

THERE are roughly 1 500 serial rapists in the country, who have been active during the past three years – and these are just the ones the police are aware of.

But, despite the overwhelming number of cases, there are only five specialised police officers countrywide dedicated to investigating these types of criminals, says Gérard Labuschagne, head of the police’s investigative psychology section.

Situated in Pretoria and falling under the police’s forensic sciences division, the section probes psychologically-motivated crimes including muti murders, other unusual murders, serial killings and serial rapes. At any given time the section, which is stretched to capacity, is investigating a number of criminals around the country.

“When we detect some cases, we forward them on because there are too many for us to get involved in,” Labuschagne said in an exclusive telephone interview permitted by the national police.

“We’re always busy. There’s never a moment we’re not busy with a serial case in the country.”

In recent cases the section has dealt with, Thabo Bester, who became known as the “Facebook rapist”, was arrested two weeks ago and pleaded guilty to raping two models in Durban in August.

He was sentenced to 50 years imprisonment and faces more charges in Cape Town and Gauteng.

On Monday, Johannes Jacobus Steyn admitted to being the “Sunday rapist” who preyed on young girls in Gauteng and North West.

He also faces additional charges including 13 counts of rape, one of murder and 10 of kidnapping.

Labuschagne said there were currently about 1 500 serial rapists on the police’s database.

Some of these were still on the loose, some were in police custody awaiting trial and others may have been convicted. “But it’s impossible to know exactly how many (serial rapists) there actually are. We always assume there are more,” Labuschagne said.

All the 1 500 serial rapists on the database had committed a rape within the past three years.

Labuschagne said rapists were usually tracked using DNA samples and were classified as serial after committing two rapes.

“DNA is the easiest way to track them. When a case is opened we check at neighbouring police stations to see if there are similar cases. We look in other areas only if there’s a reason to look in that specific area,” he said.

Labuschagne said the police had a serial DNA unit in their forensics laboratory which had the list of serial rapists.

DNA samples of suspected rapists were tested and this was how more incidents could be linked to the rapists already on the list, or more names were added to it.

When the DNA unit had a “double hit” – when the DNA sample of a rapist matched another sample – he was classified as a serial rapist and investigations into his actions were intensified.

Labuschagne said there tended to be more serial rapists in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. He did not know why.

He said the Western Cape had also had its share of serial rapists.

But he said up until about a year ago it had been difficult to track serial rapists operating in the Western Cape as officers in the police’s Western Cape Forensic Science Laboratory had only tested certain victims’ samples.

Usually, when a rape survivor was sexually assaulted and the matter was reported to the police, a sexual assault kit was compiled.

Samples, including bodily fluids forming part of the kit, were then tested and those results could then be matched to a blood sample taken from the rape suspect, linking a suspect to a rape survivor.

Labuschagne said previously, sexual assault kits from survivors in cases where a suspect had not been identified, had not been processed in the province’s forensics laboratory.

“The thinking was, if you don’t have a suspect why process that sample,” Labuschagne said.

He said this had changed in the past year when a new police officer had been put in charge of the laboratory, and now all samples were processed.

This made it easier to link suspects to cases, and police could therefore see if they could be regarded as serial rapists.

Labuschagne said aside from serial rapists, the investigative psychology section probed serial killers. “If there’s a murder series (a serial killer), no matter how busy we are we always get involved,” he said.

In Labuschagne’s 10 years in the investigative psychology section he said he had probed more than 70 serial murder cases and 200 serial rape cases.

Members of his section went out and helped detectives investigate a specific crime. They generally did not take over the investigation, but assisted and guided where they could.

Labuschagne said he hoped satellite stations, branching from the investigative psychology section, would be established in the provinces during the next two years as this would ease the section’s workload.

He said he was involved in training other police officers and once a year gave short presentations to detectives to sensitise them to the crimes they were likely to investigate.

University of Cape Town is launching a new MSc (Med) (Biomedical Forensic Science) in 2012. This is a first for any South African University and a qualification sorely needed in South Africa. Graduates will be part of a selected group of Scientists with advanced training, laboratory and legal expertise who can manage and develop forensic laboratories as well as conduct high impact research.  As is well-known, there is a dearth of forensic scientists in the country and while the state forensic science laboratories are trying to cope with the workload, the staff seldom has the time or the training to conduct high quality scientific research.  There is a definite need to establish forensic research units in the various disciplines that constitute the complex field of forensics. Tertiary institutions are ideally suited to conduct such high impact research and train these much needed scientists.

The programme UCT will be launching in 2012 is an integrated, multidisciplinary Master’s course and will address the lack of post graduate trained forensic scientists as well as provide the foundation for research in this field from a South African perspective.

Admission requirements: BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry, Chemistry, Microbiology, Biology or Physical Anthropology, Human Genetics or an approved alternative 4-years BSc (or equivalent) or expert in field (RPL)

Length: 2 years Full Time or 4 years Part Time

Purpose:

• To equip students with advanced scientific knowledge, laboratory and legal expertise and leadership skills at an MSc level. • To equip students with research skills to contribute to the national and international body of research in laboratories, death and crime scenes.

Modules:

Forensic Pathology: cause of death; theories of crime and victimisation; criminal justice system; expert witness testifying.

Forensic Anthropology and Archaeology: retrieval and study of human remains;  decomposition of soft and hard tissue; archaeological protocols;identification of age, sex and biographic features of human skeletons.

Forensic Toxicology: appropriate toxicological specimen collection; transport, preparation, analysis of most major toxic agents; reporting on findings.

Molecular Forensics: DNA analysis of crime scenes; quality assurance in molecular forensic laboratories; knowledge to provide expert molecular testimony; microbial pathogenesis and bioterrorism.

Applied Forensic Science: integrate and apply knowledge gained to case simulations from a crime or death scene through to the courtroom appearance.

Quantitative Research Methodology: prepare research proposals; use quantitative methods; cooperate as a team in research protocol development.

Minor Research Dissertation: select a topic in which he/she has a particular interest.

Click here for more information, or if you interested in applying for this MSc, please contact Dr Marise Heynsat UCT on marise.heyns@uct.ac.za or tel (021) 406 6604.

The DNA Project prides itself in reaching the public and first responders at a crime scene to make sure they understand the importance of protecting the evidence left behind. Most notably is our new ‘Train the Trainer’ course which is a full day programme developed to educate trainers from various institutions on how to teach crime scene preservation by giving them the background knowledge to allow them to integrate this information into their own course work.

Grant with the paramedics from the College of Emergency Care

These past couple months we have spoken to 1269 people in KZN, Gauteng and Western Cape., of those, 433 were from SAPS and 240 metro police officers, the rest comprise paramedics, security personnel and ordinary citizens. With us reaching this already large number of people being trained on a regular basis, once the ‘Train the Trainer’ workshops are up and running the amount of people trained in crime scene preservation can only increase.

Workshops are not the only thing The DNA Project focuses on: one of our main concerns is the change required in legislation which will allow the police to finally use a National DNA Database as an effective criminal intelligence tool. We are still awaiting the final report on Portfolio Committee’s international fact finding mission from over 3 months ago. You can rest assured that we will continue to put pressure on the committee until this information is finally released at whch time we shall be reporting back on their findings.

Additionally, Vanessa Lynch and Carolyn Hancock will be presenting at the 3rd Annual African DNA Forensics Conference in Pretoria at the end of the month.

With such a strong body of highly qualified professionals working for the DNA Project, we can only reach more and more people every single day, making sure that the average South African citizen as well as first responders are aware of the importance DNA evidence in catching and convicting criminals.

Grant Godsmark