‘A powerful book that shows what spying for the public good might look like.’ – Jacob Dlamini, historian and author of The Terrorist Album

In the 1990s former SARS executive Johann van Loggerenberg was a deep cover police agent, working for a unit that combatted organised crime. He not only rubbed shoulders with drug lords, smugglers and corrupt cops but was also instrumental in foiling a bank heist.

Read his account of his close encounter with uncut diamonds, a group of bank robbers, and a man who got shot in the foot – twice – in this excerpt from his new book Cop Under Cover.

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During October 1996 the Organised Crime Unit – the police unit I worked for as a deep cover agent – sent me on a two-week course to learn to evaluate and assess diamonds of all kinds, cut and uncut. I enjoyed not only the change of scenery and the intellectual stimulation, but also not having to sleep with one eye and one ear open all the time.

Unless you’re a registered and licensed dealer, possession and selling of uncut diamonds in South Africa is illegal. The value of polished and legitimately traded diamonds is determined by ‘the four Cs’: carats, or the weight, of the stone – the bigger the diamond, the more valuable it is; colour, which actually refers to the lack of colour and varies from the very sought-after blue-white to an almost brown or black; clarity, which refers to the number of blemishes (external characteristics) and inclusions (internal characteristics) in a stone, and is measured from ‘flawless’ to ‘included’; and cut, or the way the gemcutter has fashioned the stone so its proportions, symmetry and polish deliver the most magnificent return of light.

The idea was to utilise me in an ongoing operation on the West Coast where the plundering and smuggling of uncut diamonds was starting to get out of control and a big syndicate had a monopoly. Ultimately, however, it was decided not to deploy me in that diamond operation, as my placement within a range of other longer-term operations was considered too useful to sacrifice for the short term. The training didn’t go to waste, though.

Some time after I arrived back in Durban, Calvin – one of my contacts in the underworld – pitched up at my place. He wanted me to go with him to meet some people, he said: he thought he had an opportunity to make some money on the side. Calvin always had some or other scheme up his sleeve, and forever got involved with the wrong crowd as a result.

That evening, Calvin and I knocked at the door of a nondescript flat in a block in downtown Durban. The short man who opened the door, John, embraced Calvin – clearly, they had history. As John hobbled ahead of us down the short entrance corridor and into the living room of the flat, I noticed his left foot was thickly wrapped in a bandage.

John invited us to sit on the plush salmon-coloured leather couches and poured us expensive whisky in tumblers – neat, no ice. As we sipped, Calvin and John spoke a bit of this and that, catching up on old times. John was clearly in pain, because every time he moved his bandaged foot, he grimaced and knocked down another whisky. ‘Medicine,’ he said.

Soon there was another knock on the door and Robert joined our party. Robert, as tall as John was short, exchanged some words in isiZulu with our host, before including Calvin and me in the conversation. He then reached into his leather-jacket pocket and hauled out a little black velvet bag.

From a satchel he was carrying, he took out a small electronic scale and some other paraphernalia, before carefully scattering what looked like glass chips of different sizes and colours onto John’s large glass coffee table. I could now recognise uncut diamonds when I saw them.

Holding out a pair of tweezers – a diamond should never be handled – and a loupe, a small eyeglass with ten-times magnification, Robert addressed me. ‘You wanna check these?’

I took a sip of whisky, feigning disinterest. ‘Where are they from?’ I asked.

Robert didn’t respond, simply pushing the tweezers and loupe closer to me. I shrugged and took them, leaning forward slowly over the stones and examining each carefully before dropping it onto the scale. There were 17 stones in total, and each weighed more than a carat; most were of the purest colours, along the white range.

I didn’t doubt for a second that Robert’s diamonds had value on the underground market but this seemed too easy. The trade in uncut diamonds in Durban wasn’t significant at all. Was it a setup? I knew several detectives were after me so I was extremely sceptical.

‘I’ll take them,’ I told Robert, ‘but I’m not fronting any cash. I’ll show them to my money man. He may be interested.’ If it was a trap, at least there’d be no exchange of money.

Remarkably, Robert agreed to my suggestion, and swept the stones back into the little bag and handed it over to me. This made me suspect that the diamonds were an attempt to buy me.

John, apparently emboldened by Robert’s success, now began a conversation with me in some kind of code. ‘Listen, bra,’ he said, ‘would you be able to help in hiding transport and offramps that we need from time to time for appointments?’

‘Let me think about it,’ I said. Then, buying time, I asked him, ‘What happened to your foot?’

‘Ha, a job in the Midlands. It was messy and there was a shootout. Some of the guys got killed. I got away but …’ He gestured to his foot. ‘Luckily, I know a nurse who took out the bullet.’

So John was part of a group of bank robbers. ‘Offramps’, I would come to learn, referred to getaway cars, which were usually parked out of sight of the robbery scene.

The robbers, having done the heist – the ‘appointment’ – would drive to the getaway car, then switch cars to escape unseen while the police were looking for the ‘transport’ that had been seen leaving the crime scene. In those days, the preferred ‘transport’ and ‘offramps’ were fast cars like Golf GTIs and the BMW 333s, stolen or hijacked. The gang needed someone not linked to their robbery syndicate who could front as the owner or lessee of a quiet property where they could store these hot cars.

During a quick meeting at the Berea Mall the next day, I handed the 17 uncut diamonds, each one individually vacuum-packed, over to Grobbie.

I never heard from Robert again.

Some weeks later John called. Had I made up my mind yet, he wanted to know.

I played coy on the phone, and said I’d go around to his place later that day.

When I arrived late that Saturday afternoon, John met me at the door. His foot was still bandaged and he was still hobbling – he complained that the wound wasn’t healing.

In the living room six men were lounging on the leather couches. There were overflowing ashtrays on the glass coffee table, and empty beer and hard-liquor bottles all over the place. A few women, dressed in short shorts and skimpy tops, perched on knees and chairs. One was preparing food in the kitchen. I’d clearly missed a party.

Two of the men stood up, shouting at me in isiZulu, one pulling a pistol from the back of his pants and pointing it at me. A glance at the others told me I wasn’t welcome here – their expressions and body language were aggressive. Clearly John hadn’t told them about my imminent arrival, or maybe they just didn’t like the look of me.

Suddenly my heart started racing and a familiar feeling of dread descended on me – I was having another panic attack. Since that first one in Johannesburg, in August 1995, they’d become a fairly common occurrence.

I lost all context, all ability to concentrate; I wanted to run for the door but I couldn’t move.

‘Where’s the toilet?’ I asked John, using all my strength and energy to appear calm and collected.

He inclined his head, indicating a direction, and, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other, I walked that way.

Closing the door behind me, I leant over the small sink and ran the cold water, splashing handfuls repeatedly on my face. I concentrated on my breathing and on slowing my heart rate, and gradually the panic subsided.

I’d been in the bathroom for at least five minutes, during which time I’d heard raised voices on the other side of the door – evidently, my presence was being argued about. I decided that attack was the best form of defence.

Banging open the bathroom door, I strode into the living room and pointed at the guy who’d had the gun, who was now sprawled on one of the sofas. ‘Who the fuck do you think you are?’ I shouted at him. ‘Do you fucking know me? I have people who’ll stuff that gun down your throat and make you swallow it, my man. Fuck you!’

I swung my gaze left and right, raking it across the others. ‘Fuck all of you.’ Then my eyes settled on John, sitting in a recliner-type chair, his leg stretched out in front of him. ‘And fuck you too, John.’

‘Hey, bra, relax,’ he said. ‘He didn’t mean anything. He’s sorry, okay?’ I stared at him. ‘I’m sorry too, okay?’

I slowly nodded my head, then John struggled to his feet, came over to me, and offered his hand. We did a traditional African three-part handshake – shake, grip thumbs, shake again – then John nodded to an empty chair next to the recliner, and I sat down. He shuffled back to the recliner.

Crisis over, more booze was cracked open and cigarettes lit, and the talk started flowing again – although I couldn’t follow a word as they all spoke in isiZulu. I looked casually around. Through an open door I noticed a number of automatic AK-47 rifles lying on a table in an adjoining room.

When his friends were fully involved in an animated discussion, John turned to me. In a low voice, he asked if I could rent a plot somewhere outside Durban, in my name, where they could store the ‘transport’. He offered to pay me a large deposit in advance in cash – I could name the amount. ‘We just have to attend to an “appointment”, then we’ll have the cash to pay you whatever you want,’ he said.

What would the risk to me be? I asked. Almost none, he assured me.

Finally, I said, ‘Okay, I’ll do it.’

I got up to leave and John followed me. At the door, out of earshot of his cronies, I asked him in a low voice, ‘Your “appointment” tomorrow – who’s it with?’

John blinked, looked quickly back at the room where his guys were sprawled about, then turned back to me and whispered, ‘The FNB in Maritzburg.’

‘Okay, as soon as you guys are clear and you have cash on hand, call me and we’ll talk the details,’ I said, all business. Then I winked at him and said, ‘Don’t get shot in your other foot …’

The minute I left John’s flat, I contacted my handlers at the OCU Grobbie Grobbelaar and Stu Dubber and asked for an emergency meeting. There was no time to waste – the intelligence was solid and the action needed was clear. Bank robberies were spiking around Durban and Pietermaritzburg at the time, and sometimes there were violent shootouts between the police and the robbers. People got killed in these crimes, and sometimes innocent bystanders lost their lives.

Grobbie and Stu passed the information to the relevant detectives, who immediately hit John’s flat with the intention of seizing the guns, hoping to use them to connect John and his cronies to other crimes. But they found the flat empty.

The Durban Serious and Violent Crimes Unit liaised with its counterparts in Pietermaritzburg and, armed with my descriptions of the seven suspects, a stakeout was planned. Detectives in plain clothes got ready to place themselves at various locations around and inside the bank very early that morning.

Some time after the bank opened, John and his crew struck and a shootout ensued. One policeman was seriously wounded but survived, two of the robbers were killed, and John was shot and wounded in his right hand. And in the other foot.

The surviving five suspects, including John, were arrested and all their illegal firearms were recovered. All were ultimately convicted – several of them were linked to a spate of earlier robberies in the province and elsewhere – and ended up in jail for many years. DM/ ML

Johann van Loggerenberg is the co-author of the bestseller Rogue (2016), Death and Taxes (2017) and Tobacco Wars (2019). After working as an undercover police agent, he joined SARS in 1998 and resigned as Group Executive: Tax and Customs Enforcement Investigations in 2015. Since then he has been a registered tax practitioner and consultant and researcher to local and international law, auditing and forensic firms, academic institutions and anti-organised crime organisations. He is also regularly called upon by the media to comment on and contribute to content relating to organised commercial crimes.

Cop Under Cover: My Life in the Shadows With Drug Lords, Robbers and Smugglers by Johann van Loggerenberg is published by Jonathan Ball Publishers. (R275). Visit The Reading List for South African book news – including excerpts! – daily.