Empangeni - Empangeni Police Station has been rocked by the death of a colleague, police said on Friday.
Veteran police officer, Warrant Officer Niren Ramasaroop, 40, was killed while on duty on Friday morning.
Brigadier Jay Naicker said at 10am on Friday morning, Ramsaroop was patrolling the Empangeni CBD with colleagues in a police vehicle when three women approached the police officers.
Naicker said the women told police that two men had robbed them of R110 000 in cash.
The women said they had withdrawn stokvel money from a local bank when the two men accosted them.
“Warrant Officer Ramsaroop spotted one of the men and managed to grab hold of him. The man then produced a firearm and shot the police officer in chest. The injured member managed to return fire and shot the suspect, wounding him in his leg,” Naicker said.
“Warrant Officer Ramsaroop succumbed to the gunshot wound to his chest a short while later.”
The 41-year-old suspect shot in the leg was arrested and taken to hospital, where he remains under police guard.
The other suspect ran away with the bag of containing the stolen money. Police said they were on the lookout for the suspect.
A pistol, which had its serial number erased, was recovered at the scene.
Ramasaroop, who served the police force for 21 years and was from Glencoe, was remembered by colleagues as “a dedicated police officer who was always in the front-line of crime fighting initiatives.”
KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner, Lieutenant General Mmamonnye Ngobeni has requested detectives “not to rest” until they arrest suspect who fled with the money.
“I want to urge the outstanding suspect to hand himself over and he should not even try to enjoy himself with his ill-gotten gains as he will be behind bars soon,” said Ngobeni.
“I want to extend my heartfelt condolences to the family, friends and colleagues of Warrant Officer Ramsaroop. He has been a committed and hard-working member of the SAPS and his superiors speak very highly of him. We are all saddened by his loss,” she said.
African News Agency