IN THE HIGH COURT OF SOUTH AFRICA
(WESTERN CAPE HIGH COURT, CAPE TOWN)

In the matter between:

JUDGMENT

In this matter the appellants were convicted in the Wynberg Regional Court on charges of robbery, attempted robbery and attempted murder, stemming from a failed cash in transit heist and thereafter the robbery of a person whose vehicle they wanted to use to flee the scene. All three of the appellants were relatively young, in fact two of them were under 18 at the time of the commission of the offence and were sentenced to an effective term of 18 years imprisonment by the Regional Court magistrate, as he then was.

On the facts of the case it was clear that the appellants would have planned the event, armed themselves with, including a shotgun, an automatic machine gun, in an attempt to commit the offences. They were caught almost red-handedly and immediately arrested. They spent approximately two years as awaiting trial prisoners.

It is, however, unfortunate on the other hand that numerous of the serious offences that occur and that appear in these courts, are committed by young people. In this instant case, it was not a case of young persons not thinking their actions through, that have encountered criminality upon their way, but rather young persons who have planned to go out and commit these serious offences. It is common cause that a term of imprisonment was appropriate. The only complaint from the appellants are that the term was too lengthy.

In my view, there is no merit in the appeal on sentence and the sentence should be confirmed, it being an appeal only against sentence.

VAN STADEN, AJ