Eight South African police officers will appear in a magistrate’s court on Monday to face charges of torturing and murdering a Nigerian citizen during a drugs raid a year ago.
The Independent Police Investigative Directorate says forensic pathologists found the man had been suffocated.
Police are sticking to their version of events in Vanderbijlpark, south of Johannesburg a year ago.
They maintain officers conducting a drug raid found the dead body of 25-year-old Nigerian Ibrahim Badmus on the lawn.
They allege that the officers were attacked by a group they identified as drug dealers.
The Independent Police Investigative Directorate says there was hostility from police when they conducted their probe.
They discount the police assertion that Badmus was in possession of drugs.
They say they made the arrests yesterday (Friday) of two policewomen and six policemen based on the findings of two forensic pathologists and the statements by several witnesses that Badmus was alive when he was taken for interrogation by police.
Nigerian consul-general Godwin Adama said the death of Badmus was one death too many.
He said he and a team from the consulate had visited the scene to interface with the Nigerian citizens‚ with the hope of de-escalating tension‚ to allow the law enforcement agents to investigate the incident.
He expressed the hope that justice would be done.