A wasted talent
It is now 12 years since Jeremy ‘Maya’ Jansen walked out on parole from the Pollsmoor Prison, but the scars of the time incarcerated at the notorious maximum-security facility remain fresh in his mind.
With well over 100 appearances in the PSL at Seven Stars, Ajax Cape Town and Santos, the then 25-year-old found himself standing as accused for abduction, attempted rape and assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
The events at Sunrise Beach in Muizenberg in September 2002 led to the beginning of his trial, which lasted two years before he was sentenced.
When I look back to the time I spent inside, I am glad that it didn’t destroy me and leave me shattered like what it does to most guys that I found inside. It was easier to end up a lost cause who had given up on life, but I didn’t,” he admits.
The tears might have long dried up but the psychological bruises of being locked up in a gangster-infested prison will never heal for Jansen.
“It was a tough time being in prison, but I made it through. I saw all the crazy things in prison from the bad to the extreme. And luckily for me, I made a good friend who had already been
