Robbery (Feb 2014)

Robbed on a Saturday morning! What a terrifying experience. After such a good January where everything was going so well, the 1st of February 2014 turned out to be just the opposite. Claudette had gone into work to finish off a few things that she couldn't complete the day before. I had a gardener helping me move a palm tree from the back yard to the pavement so that we could start with our building renovations.

The palm was very heavy and the gardener and I had it on a trolley and was pulling it on the trolley from the back yard. Because of it being so heavy, I had to leave the garage door open (only access to the back yard) to get it through to the pavement. The door was open for about 2 or 3 minutes. 11am would turn our world completely upside down and cause a big change in our lives.

We were near to the front yard with the palm when I saw a car pull up outside the garage. A moment later I heard the maid scream and I ran inside the house to see what was happening. I didn't think anything of the car at that stage. I thought she might be screaming because of a snake or a rat or something. As I got into the house 2 men were pointing a gun at me and told me to get on the floor.

They tied my hands behind my back and my feet together with cable ties and put a towel over my head so that I couldn't see them. The maid and gardener were also tied up with cable ties. There were 4 armed guys all together and I could hear them going through all the cupboards in the house. At one point they untied my feet and asked me to show them the safe and open it. I was then tied up again. A while later they kept asking me if my car had a tracker system. When I said No, they said I am lying and pushed a blunt knife into my back. After repeatedly saying it doesn't, they eventually left me alone. I could hear the car idling in the garage for a while (obviously they were testing to see if it had a tracker or not).

After about 20 minutes they left. I managed to get loose quite fast and immediately called the police before untying the gardener and maid. After the police arrived we noticed that they had taken a lot of items. These items include my car (which I only had for 2 weeks), bicycle, tv, jewelry (including wedding ring), camera, clothes, shoes, toolboxes, power tools, etc.

20 Minutes of madness changed our lives completely and forced us to move to a secure complex within an estate.