The labour court has upheld the dismissal of a City of Cape Town law enforcement officer who lost her service firearm, ammunition and magazines during a strike in 2023.
The court ruled that fatigue and long working hours do not excuse the loss of a weapon entrusted to an officer.
Between March 20 and 23 2023, when she was working unusually long hours while a taxi strike was in progress, Venus Jansen lost her firearm along with 34 rounds of ammunition and two magazines.
She only reported the loss on March 23. Other than attributing the loss to her alleged diminished mental capacity owing to the overtime she was working, she offered no explanation of where she might have lost it.
Jansen was charged and found guilty of failing to take proper care of the employer’s assets, of not reporting the loss timeously to the police and not storing her firearm in the prescribed manner. The misconduct was viewed in a very serious light, and she was dismissed by the city.
After her dismissal on October 10 2023, and the dismissal of her internal appeal against the findings and the sanction on December 6 that year, Jansen made a referral to the South African Local Government Bargaining Council on January 9 2024, together with a brief condonation application as she had made the referral out of the period allowed.
On the evidence before the arbitrator, I am not persuaded that Jansen’s defence based entirely on alleged diminished mental capacity arising from working long hours has a reasonable prospect of success in absolving her of responsibility for such critical items in her custody going missing.
— Judge Robert Lagrange
The arbitrator dismissed her condonation application and did not consider it necessary to consider the merits of the dismissal. This led Jansen to approach the labour court, which on Monday reinstated her review application.
The court then dealt with the question of whether Jansen had demonstrated she had some reasonable prospect of success in showing she had been unfairly dismissed.
In his judgment, judge Robert Lagrange said Jansen’s defence did not attempt to address how she could have unintentionally lost track of a firearm, a considerable amount of ammunition and magazines, which together comprised a “bulky collection of items”.
Lagrange said Jansen’s defence completely avoided trying to give any plausible explanation how or when the loss could have happened.
“Rather it is one that apparently seeks to absolve herself of responsibility, in whole or in part, for not retaining control and possession of the items owing to her alleged diminished mental capacity caused by fatigue.
“Considering what she testified at her disciplinary inquiry it also entails complete amnesia on her part in relation to events that might explain how the items went missing,” Lagrange said.
He said in her disciplinary inquiry, the presiding officer had noted Jansen’s complaint of working long hours but concluded she had been entitled to refuse to work the overtime.
Lagrange said it was common cause that a loss of a firearm is an extremely serious form of misconduct, not least because of the fatal ramifications it could have if it had fallen into the wrong hands.
“On the evidence before the arbitrator, I am not persuaded that Jansen’s defence based entirely on alleged diminished mental capacity arising from working long hours has a reasonable prospect of success in absolving her of responsibility for such critical items in her custody going missing,” Lagrange said as he dismissed Jansen’s review application with no order as to costs.
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