Name Lee McCall | ||
Died 1984, Houghton Estate, Johannesburg, South Africa | ||
Lee McCall
Lee McCall (1950 – 30 January 1984) was a member of the Stander Gang, a group of three escaped convicts who went on a bank robbing spree in South Africa from October 1983 until February 1984. The group was named for Andre Stander, who gained fame for having been a Captain of Detectives in the Johannesburg Police when he started his individual crime spree before being arrested. The third member was Allan Heyl.
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Lee McCall was the only gang member with whom the South African police managed to catch up before he could flee the country. Several call girls who the gang had employed at their safehouse from time to time assisted the police in locating the safe house. They moved on the location early in the morning on 30 January 1984. At the time that their SWAT units surrounded the house, only McCall was present. Stander was in Fort Lauderdale trying to arrange for the planned sale of a sailing yacht that the gang was going to use to escape the country. Heyl was still in South Africa, possibly at one of the gang's two other safehouses. McCall wouldn't surrender himself. He instead starting looking out of several windows in different rooms, attempting to ascertain whether the policemen were trying to maneuver their way into house surreptitiously. He then began shooting first, aiming at the police. The police returned fire and McCall was subsequently shot to death.
Stander, hearing about what happened, was essentially stranded in Florida. He too was killed, in a shootout with Fort Lauderdale police.
Heyl left the other safehouses or wherever he had been at the time of McCall's death, and fled to Greece, then England (where he committed a serious robbery with only small proceeds), then Spain. He was eventually arrested by the British, served time in prison there for the robbery and a weapons charge, and was finally extradited to South Africa. In South Africa he was sentenced to 33 years in prison.