Chapter 9 - Parole - South African Government Information

Notwithstanding these charges, he was eventually found guilty of a competent
verdict of assault and was sentenced as follows:
“Three (3) years’ imprisonment of which two (2) years be suspended
for a period of five (5) years on condition that he was not convicted of
an offence of which assault forms an ingredient during the period of
suspension.”
This effectively meant that he was serving an effective sentence of one (1) year‘s
imprisonment.
The Commission heard the matter of Mr Hlongwane in March 2004 at which time
he had served about 75% of his sentence. Because of the problems with the
parole system at Atteridgeville, Mr Hlongwane, who had been arrested for
nothing more than a common assault, served a great portion of his sentence and
was only released when the members of the Atteridgeville Management area
realized that the Commission was interested in the Hlongwane matter. As a
result, he was released on 3 March 2004.
It is also apparent from his records that Mr Hlongwane had no previous
convictions nor did he have any pending charges against him. In actual fact, he
had reported a matter as a complainant against another prisoner. Instead of him
being regarded as a complainant, it was reflected in his records that there was a
pending case, which, according to the officials at the prison, led to the decision
not to release him. They treated him in the same manner as an accused or
suspect with a pending further charge instead of protecting him as a witness in
the criminal justice system.
Furthermore, it was also apparent that even though the nature of the assault was
not clarified in the prison file, according to Departmental policy assault is
regarded as an “aggressive crime” regardless of the real conduct of the
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