PMB prison break mastermind killed in Scottsville: Police
One of the seven suspects who were killed during Tuesday's shootout with police in Scottsville masterminded the prisoner escape in Pietermaritzburg over month ago.
Police say he had been among ten remaining escaped inmates yet to be recaptured.
A total of 45 awaiting trial prisoners were being transported to court in late April when the police truck ferrying them was ambushed.
Thirty-one suspects escaped. Some of them have since been re-arrested.
Speaking at a press conference in Durban on Wednesday afternoon, KZN Police Commissioner, Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, said they'd established the man that was killed yesterday had planned the ambush to break himself out of prison.
"He was heartless basically. He's been with a number of cases and almost all his cases that he is involved with he always finds a way of killing witnesses.
"He will find when he goes to court he will get to know who is testifying and who is related to who and he finds a way of communicating with people outside to get those witnesses killed.
"He could not kill the other witnesses because of the witness protection programme that we had so we were able to keep the witnesses safe. Because of desperation he resorted to escaping."
READ: Suspected Scottsville gang were on police radar for murder, rape: Cele
Police say yesterday's raid on the property in Scottsville was carried out after officers received intelligence about a gang believed to have been responsible for a reign of terror in Plessislaer.
It's believed members of the gang had been using a vacant house in the suburb as a hideout.
Two women are among the seven people killed, but it's unclear what their link to the other five suspects was.
