More than a dozen women say they have fallen prey to at least three suspected stalkers on the Gautrain, yet none of the men identified has been banned from the train.
Last month, the Sunday Times reported that a man was terrorising women commuters, and this week the private investigator probing the matter said he had discovered two more alleged stalkers and 14 victims.
Forensic psychologist Dr Gérard Labuschagne, a former head of the SA Police Service investigative psychology unit, said he had informed Gautrain management that the men had been stalking their victims between Hatfield and Pretoria stations since 2017.
Labuschagne said that after the Sunday Times article, one of the suspected stalkers handed him a signed statement undertaking not to stalk anyone, and the letter was passed to Gautrain management and the police.
Letters between Labuschagne and Gautrain's lawyers, seen by the Sunday Times, show that Labuschagne was instructed to refer all victims who approached him to them. He was questioned about why he signed the "agreement" with the alleged perpetrator and asked to explain why he was acting for the victims.
"We are concerned that your continued interaction in this matter are [sic] jeopardising our client's ongoing investigation," said one letter to the psychologist.
In his response, Labuschagne said the stalker approached him with a signed letter and he merely witnessed it and passed it on.
He told Gautrain management that he knew of 14 victims "stalked by at least three different stalkers. Twelve have confirmed being stalked by one of the stalkers, one by another identified stalker, and the last by an unidentified stalker."
Three victims, separate from those the Sunday Times originally spoke to, said the stalkers had made their lives "hell".
One woman, in a sworn statement to Gautrain management, said she is being harassed "at least three times a week" on her train home by a man who made "extra effort" to stare at her from between the seats "with a really weird smile".
She said: "He would stand really close behind me on the escalators at the Hatfield station ... as if he was trying to smell me, because his head would be right behind my neck."
A guard who she asked for help told her "maybe the guy was interested in me and I should give him a chance to talk to me", she said.
Another woman, who said she has been stalked since early 2017, said: "Every time he saw me he would ask what time I am catching the train home. Even when I started catching the train from Centurion instead of Hatfield, he would be waiting for me."
An Exclusive Books employee, whose affidavit has been seen by the Sunday Times, said her stalker followed her into Sandton City shopping centre in June 2018 and "stopped me and said I was looking lovely".She said: "He still follows me ... onto different carriages when I try to get away from him. He follows me onto the buses to work. He puts us through complete hell."Police spokesperson Capt Marvin Masondo said descriptions of the stalkers and their modus operandi were shared with guards and police assigned to the Gautrain.Gautrain spokesperson Kesagee Nayager declined to comment...