Constable Vlotman is given a R500 fine and a five year suspension sentence

On 18 January 1987, Constable Vlotman a member of the South African Police Services (SAPS) who assaulted three journalists in Athlone, Cape Town, in September 1985, was given a R500 fine and suspended for three years. Constable Vlotman had jumped out of a police Casspir and assaulted the journalists with a sjambok as they were sheltering from birdshot and teargas. The verdict against Constable Vlotman may have been intended to create the impression that the Apartheid government was concerned about threats to media freedom. However, the sentence meted out suggests that the Apartheid government was simulteneously making a mockery of the attack on the journalists and showing a concealed disdain for media freedom.