Alarming rise in public executions via mob justice

Among the alarming statistics produced by the SAPS last week was an indication of the number of people killed by mob violence. In her A Matter of Justice column on the Legalbrief site, Carmel Rickard looks at those figures, and at a case that illustrates the reality of popular executions. The case concerns a woman charged with the murder of a man suspected to have stolen a cellphone that belonged to a member of her family. He was stripped naked, bound with wire hand and foot, and beaten to death. His executioners were a group of people within a community fed up because they felt the police did not help them catch criminals.