The intervention of neighbourhood watch members helped find four missing boys who were taken to the beach by a jong man known to them.
The laaities were not seen for almost 24 hours when they were eventually found in Bellville and the Cape Town CBD.
The 22-year-old man who took them is reportedly a drug addict.
The three teens who remained with the man are Ethan Miller, 11, Norman Scot, 12, and 16-year-old Mikyle Jacobs.
After hearing about the case, neighbourhood watch members from Echo, Unity, Sherlock, and Eagle Eye, as well as Ward 20 activists helped with the search.
After driving around Bellville they found one of the boys.
Echo patrollers chairperson Susan Amaraah Jantjies said: “We have been looking for missing people for a long time.
“When someone sent a message about the kids on the Delft crime group we decided to go and search.
“The kids’ parents were with us when one of the members hired a taxi to take us to Bellville, we were just following a lead.
“When we got there we saw a lady who knew about the missing boys and told us that she had just seen him around and we went looking for him.”
Susan explained that when the boy went into the taxi he was very confused.
The laaitie told the patrollers he left with the 22-year-old but then in once in Town, the group chased him away.
“I walked to Bellville from Town and I don’t know where the others went,” the boy told the Daily Voice.
The investigating officer arrived at Delft Saps, where the missing laaitie was and asked him to take him where the others were.
When they arrived in the CBD, they drove around until they found the other three kids with the 22-year-old man.
mandilakhe.tshwete@inl.co.za