Heroic Cape Town officer reflects on 26 years since dramatic kidnapping rescue
Traffic officer Andre Rautenbach returned eight-month-old Brett, who was kidnapped from his Camps Bay home on May 3, 2000.
Image: Supplied
Retired traffic officer Andre Rautenbach, who 26 years ago rescued eight-month-old Brett who was kidnapped from his Camps Bay family home, says he would do it again and prayed that his story inspires Capetonians to care and "be obedient to God".
In the dramatic act of bravery by the Cape Town traffic officer that captured the heart of the nation, Rautenbach traced and found Brett in the Bo-Kaap.
Sunday, May 3, marked the 26th anniversary of the event.
Earlier this year, he launched his book Fifteen Minutes That Changed Everything: Darkness Leads to Ultimate Glory, which documents the events and accounts from the kidnapped Brett, his parents, and their reunion.
Rautenbach, who worked in Mitchells Plain at the time and now lives in Kraaifontein, said his main aim was to return Brett to his parents.
"I did not do it for fame or glory. At the time, I thought about myself as a parent of two children, aged two and six, and what I would do if it were my children," he said.
The minute he took Brett out of the vehicle found in Bo-Kaap, he bonded with the baby.
"I think of him as a son from another mother, and he regards me as a father," he said.
Rautenbach, then a traffic officer, caught the radio alert.
Brett, from America, with retired traffic officer Andre Rautenbach, who returned him to his parents hours after being kidnapped from their Camps Bay family home 26 years ago.
Image: Supplied
Driven by intuition - what he describes as "God speaking to him" - he spotted a suspicious white BMW without number plates.
He found the abandoned car, and, following a faint cry, discovered Brett crammed beneath the passenger seat.
Rautenbach said it was about being oblivious to the noise around oneself.
"If this one life-changing moment or someone reads my book or this story and it has a positive impact to change his or her life, to realise that there is a God above and that there are good people in the world around us," he said.
He said in today's world, people walk past each other and they mind their own business.
"But it needs to be known that we need more good people and they are out there," he said.
He said that day he had to block out the voices and focus on what God was telling him.
"God is not going to touch anyone's mind, heart, and soul. That day I was only an instrument there, and God chose me to return this son back to his parents," he said.
Shortly after the attempted kidnapping, Brett and his family immigrated to America, where they still live today.
However, the family returns to the Mother City for holidays, and Brett returned for his engagement in Cape Town, which Rautenbach attended.
It was Brett's future in-laws at the time that inspired him to put pen to paper about a year ago.
Brett also attended the book launch in January.