‘It Happened So Fast’: Joburg Woman Survives Chilling Driveway Hijacking and Kidnapping

For Kira Scopp, a quiet Friday night catch-up with a friend outside her Sydenham home turned into the kind of nightmare most people only hear about on the news.

Within minutes, she went from chatting in the driveway to being shoved into a stranger’s van at gunpoint the latest victim in Johannesburg’s growing wave of express kidnappings.

A new face of violent crime

Once, hijackings were mostly about stealing cars and valuables. Now, criminals are increasingly after something less visible but just as valuable, personal information. Security expert Gerrit van Heerden from Community Monitoring Services says the shift is driven by technology.

“Life is digital now,” he explains. “Criminals want your PINs, banking passwords, and phone access. The crime hasn’t gone away, it’s evolved.”

The set-up

Scopp remembers the scene with unsettling clarity. She and her friend had been sitting in the car for about half an hour when a small yellow e-hailing vehicle parked behind them. She thought nothing of it, until a second car pulled up, blocking their exit.

Three armed men jumped out of the Toyota Avanza. One shoved a gun into her stomach.

“He told me to get into the van. When I hesitated, he pushed harder. I froze. My body just stopped working.”

The hijackers split into two groups, one drove off in her friend’s car, while the others took Scopp and her friend on a tense, hour-long ride through Alexandra township.

The questions and the threats

Inside the van, the men demanded everything: phone codes, banking details, home addresses. Scopp says they even asked about her house keys and who was inside.

The ordeal took a darker turn when one of the men began touching her inappropriately.

“I was terrified. My body went into shock, and I ended up wetting myself. That’s when he stopped touching me. It was humiliating, but I didn’t care, I just wanted to survive.”

Her father unknowingly became a lifeline, calling her phone and tracking her location via the Life360 app. The kidnappers forced her to answer and pretend everything was fine.

A dangerous drop-off

After what felt like forever, the men decided to let them go near a police station. Before releasing them, they issued a chilling warning:

“If we dropped you somewhere else, people would beat you to death because you’re white… Be careful what you tell the police; we have people on the inside.”

Crime with a blueprint

Van Heerden says attacks like this are rarely random. Victims are often watched beforehand, their routines studied. Scopp later remembered the same yellow e-hailing car parked outside her house for days before the attack.

“If something feels off, it probably is,” Van Heerden advises. “Vary your routine, and always be alert when pulling into your driveway.”

Living with the aftermath

A week later, Scopp is back home but still on edge. Certain sounds, certain cars, especially small yellow e-hailing vehicles, trigger flashbacks.

“I never thought something like this could happen to me. It escalated so quickly. Now I know how important it is to be aware of everything.”

A growing danger for Joburg residents

Johannesburg’s hijacking statistics have long been high, but the rise in kidnappings tied to these crimes is a worrying new trend. For many, the lesson from stories like Scopp’s is sobering: in today’s South Africa, danger can arrive quietly even in your own driveway.

{Source: The Citizen}

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