Police fumble with wanted persons’ list

AN undated photograph of a 66-year-old man lies in the police files, collecting dust. After several fruitless appeals to the public on his whereabouts, police appear to have given up on finding Abergas Celso Ramos.

Charged with rape at Outapi in 1999, Ramos is still at large, seemingly cheating the justice system at will. His last known location was Okahao, reportedly visiting a local bar years ago. Police suspect Ramos may have fled to his country of origin, the Philippines.

“At this stage, he might not even be alive,” police spokesperson, Edwin Kanguatjivi said this week.

Kanguatjivi may as well have been talking about Angelo Manuel ‘Tirleni’ Perestrelo, who had been a fugitive for over two decades. He lived in Gauteng, South Africa, for most of that time, but is now interred at the Ongwediva cemetery. Perestrelo sneaked back into the country a couple of years ago when it became apparent he was dying.

Police constantly fear the surviving law-breakers are out there, plotting yet another crime or simply lying low and leading a quiet, but secret life, with no intention to atone and pay for their sins. Yet it appears the police are not making their own work any easier.

Kanguatjivi could neither establish the total number of fugitives they are after, nor say whether there is a priority list to corner the most dangerous criminals, raising doubts about their strategy to bring runaway criminals to justice.

In the case of Perestrelo, for instance, the police do not even seem to know he is dead or that he sneaked into Namibia to spend the remainder of his life with his family. In fact, they can’t even trace him on their many uncoordinated “wanted” lists.

A relative of Perestrelo confirmed to The Namibian this week that on learning that he was terminally ill, the Perestrelo family helped sneak him back into the country. Although his death was announced in the media before he was buried, Kanguatjivi could not trace his record.

“Unfortunately, I cannot provide you with an exact figure of fugitives,” said Kanguatjivi. “There are fugitives wanted for murder and other serious offences but who have not been classified in a specific order,” he confessed.

Kanguatjivi lamented the fact that some members of the public may be harbouring fugitives like Lazarus Shaduka, who is said to be living in Angola. Shaduka has a N$20 000 price tag on his head. “Either the reward we put forward is too little or people are aiding him,” Kanguanjivi said.

Criminals who should be higher up the wanted list, such as Shaduka, who was convicted of murder in 2012, don’t even feature on a recently “updated” list provided by the Namibian Police. The list only features 26 suspects who are wanted for rape, burglary, theft and housebreaking, but does not include any for murder.

Even someone, as high-profiled as Nikanor David, aka Pena, a member of the once notorious gang, Rooi Oog Van Satan Bende, who is wanted for armed robbery, is not on the list. People who know him say David slips in and out of the country at will, with the last sighting of him made during a memorial and funeral service of one of his fellow gang members in Windhoek last year.

Others missing from the list are: Namupolo Gabriel, who is wanted for robbery; Amalovu Aneas Joseph, who is wanted for theft of a motor vehicle; and Matias Sampson, who is being sought for theft and embezzlement. However, the five men are the only ones featured on the Interpol list provided by Nampol. The names are not in any order of importance or urgency.

According to police, the names appear on different uncategorised lists in no specific order, making it almost impossible to determine who the most high-ranking wanted criminals are or which ones they deem the most urgently wanted.

“Those who appear on Interpol are the ones that have likely fled outside the borders of the country,” explained Kanguatjivi. Yet, fugitives wanted for murder, such as Metra Toromba, who is suspected to have fled to South Africa or Botswana, do not appear on the Interpol list either. Toromba is facing charges of murder after killing a farmer in the early 1990s and is still to be brought to justice.

South African native, Leonard Veenendaal, one of three men arrested in December 1989 for launching an attack on a United Nations office in Namibia, and killing a policeman, is said to be living a comfortable life in the United Kingdom as a free man. He is not on any of the lists police provided.

“We are appealing to anyone with information on the whereabouts of these suspects to come forward and assist the police in bringing them to justice,” said Kanguatjivi. He said that people should not cover up for fugitives as they might be their next victims.