The attack on a female resident and fruit farmer Mieke Batelaan on Sonstraal Road in Paarl has shaken the community of rural Paarl in the Western Cape. This happened after she caught fruit thieves in the act on her farm, Melsplaas on 1 July 2023.
“This has been very upsetting,” said Drakenstain Farm Watch (DFW) general commander Daan van Leeuwen Boomkamp. “And now I’m very desperate because a female resident of the farm got injured.
“You know we work hard to supply food to families and help around the community, but it’s really not right that one of our own members gets hurt this way.”
Batelaan caught the thieves as they were loading carts with stolen fruit, consisting mostly of naartjie and guavas. She had run into the fruit thieves on her property while they were loading carts with ripe fruit and had to receive medical attention immediately.
Struck on the head with a stick
Van Leeuwen Blomkamp explained that Batelaan was confronting the offenders when she was struck in the head with a stick. She was able to walk home, and although bleeding heavily from her wound, she dialled her husband to request assistance from the DFW Emergency Radio Network.
The DFW criminal response team as well as the active emergency medical responders arrived at the location shortly after the call.
The perpetrators were apprehended quickly following the response by numerous DFW teams, and once the victim positively identified them, they were then arrested and the victim was taken to the hospital.
The ongoing threat of fruit thieves
Van Leeuwen Blomkamp said the organisation has covered similar incidents in the past where farmers were shot at, stabbed, brutally attacked, or shot in the head, had their sheep or cattle butchered, had infrastructures vandalised or destroyed, or had their families threatened with rape or death.
Farmers also suffer massive losses and damages due to fruit theft every year.
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