“They’re my heroes,” Warrant Officer Daniel Trennery, of the K9 unit in Newcastle, told the Daily News on Sunday. “If it wasn’t for them, it could have been a lot worse... But 15-year-old Ruan van Staden said “Uncle Daniel” would have done the same for him
Fifteen-year-old Ruan van Staden and his friend, Sheldon Pienaar, not pictured, have been hailed as heroes after helping to apprehend two burglars in Newcastle
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“His son, Brian, is a real good friend of mine and so Uncle Daniel and I are very close, too,” Ruan said, “I wasn’t scared, I just wanted to keep his property safe.”
On Thursday morning - while Trennery’s wife was at work and his son was with his uncle - the policeman took his baby daughter to visit family.
Unaware that no-one was home, Ruan went over to return a rugby shirt of Brian’s. When he got there, two men appeared at the security gate. They told Ruan they were fixing a pipeline but young Ruan was suspicious.
“I knew Uncle Daniel would never leave strangers at the house unsupervised,” he said. “I don’t have a phone so I ran over to my friend, Sheldon (Pienaar), who stays close by and we sent a voice note to Uncle Daniel and asked him if there were supposed to be people at the house,” he said.
Trennery replied that no one was supposed to be there and said he was on his way.
But Ruan and Sheldon - concerned and thinking there was no time to waste - jumped into action.
“Sheldon and I rushed back to the house with broomsticks,” Ruan said, “We went around the house to where the burglars had come from and saw the kitchen door and gate were both broken.”
They ran inside and discovered the house had been ransacked.
“All of Uncle Daniel’s property had been taken out of the cupboards and was lying around,” Ruan said.
Trennery - who, in the meantime had alerted police - arrived soon after. The boys ran around the block, looking for the burglars.
“A police vehicle stopped and I jumped in and spotted one guy,” Ruan said. “We chased him and they let the police dog out and he was arrested.”
A second suspect was arrested moments later. Trennery said although he was on his way home when the boys contacted him, if he had come back and interrupted the burglars, things could have transpired quite differently.
“I had my daughter with me and I discovered, when I got home, that they had found and taken my firearm,” he said.
Ruan’s mother, Mariaan, was beaming with pride on Sunday.But her son’s brave act had not come as a surprise.
“He’s always been a very brave child,” she said.
Sheldon and his family were unavailable on Sunday
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