Exhibit · Property
The Port Shepstone evidence store
The Hawks walk-in safe where seized cocaine was kept, with no working alarm, before it was stolen.
Illustration, not evidenceWhat it is
The exhibit storage facility at the Hawks Serious Organised Crime Investigation offices in Port Shepstone, KwaZulu-Natal. Testimony described the 541kg of cocaine being stored there in a walk-in safe in a building that lacked an operational alarm system and surveillance cameras. About two weeks before the theft there was an attempted break-in; on 8 November 2021 suspects entered through windows and took the cocaine.
Why it matters
The store is where the inquiry's central drug haul disappeared. Its shortcomings (no working alarm, no cameras, an ignored earlier break-in, located 100km from Durban) underpin allegations that the drugs were deliberately placed somewhere they would be easier to steal. It is the physical scene of the alleged inside-job heist.
In the record
Where this object appears
Colonel Gavin Jacob
Commander, Durban Serious Organised Crime Unit - KZN Hawks
View witness →Testified · resigned from HawksMajor General Lesetja Senona
Provincial Head, KZN Hawks (DPCI)
View witness →Testified · points up the chainBrigadier Campbell Nyuswa
Provincial Commander, Serious Organised Crime - KZN Hawks
View witness →Testified · under scrutinyLieutenant Colonel Kwazikwakhe Sibiya
Hawks officer, Durban Serious Organised Crime Unit
View witness →Related casePort Shepstone cocaine theft
View case →Sources
Where this comes from
- The Citizen: 'Extremely strange' - Madlanga commission hears details on R200m cocaine theft
- IOL: Sibiya - I followed orders in the missing cocaine case
- Daily Maverick: From bust to heist - Hawks officer says cops 'intentionally bungled' R200m cocaine haul investigation
Illustration, not a photograph of real evidence. Generated to depict an object described in the commission record.