South Africa: Paul O'Sullivan Accused of Posing As Police Officer to Get Witness Statements

Advocate Michael Mashuga told parliament's ad-hoc committee that O'Sullivan and Trent pretended to be Ipid officers and collected witness statements.

Mashuga said O'Sullivan sent him threatening emails and ran a public campaign on Radio 702 and Power FM against him.

A senior advocate has told parliament that anti-corruption investigator Paul O'Sullivan and his assistant sneaked into the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid) and interfered with a case he was running.

Advocate Michael Mashuga gave testimony before parliament's ad-hoc committee on Wednesday. The committee is looking into corruption and criminality in the criminal justice system.

Mashuga said O'Sullivan and Sarah Jane Trent pretended to be Ipid officers and collected statements from witnesses. He said two Ipid investigators, Mandlakayise Mahlangu and Temane Binang, stood by and did nothing to stop them.

In 2017, Mashuga charged O'Sullivan, Trent, Mahlangu and Binang with impersonating a police officer, fraud, extortion and breaking the Ipid Act. The charges came during a probe into then-acting national police commissioner Khomotso Phahlane. The case was later struck off the roll.

Mashuga told the committee that O'Sullivan also ran a public campaign against him, doing radio interviews on Radio 702 and Power FM.

"There was a sustained attack ... O'Sullivan went for interviews at different radio stations ... and ultimately my name even made it into a book by a certain Jacques Pauw, where allegations of state capture and corruption were made against me just because I had made a decision to prosecute Mr Paul O'Sullivan and some other suspects," Mashuga said.

He also said O'Sullivan sent him threatening emails and boasted about putting Phahlane behind bars.

Mashuga said the Ipid investigation was never truly independent. It was "infiltrated and led by O'Sullivan and Trent, who were not only biased and not independent, but who had a motive to falsely implicate Phahlane," he said.

He said some Ipid members had close ties with O'Sullivan and Trent, with favours going back and forth, all aimed at getting Phahlane removed or suspended.

His testimony is ongoing.

Read the original article on Scrolla.