John Vorster Square Police Station, was officially opened on the 23 August 1968 by John Vorster, the then prime minister of the Republic of South Africa. It was a 10 storey, blue coloured cement building. Floors 9 and 10 were occupied by the Security Branch while the detainees’ cells were on the lower floors of the building. During the Apartheid era, this Police Station, was notoriously known as a site of interrogation, torture and abuse of the Apartheid resistance fighters by the South African Security Police. (Where many people were held and tortured, and afterwards died while in custody.)
In September 1997 it was renamed: "Johannesburg Central Police Station" and still functions as a Police Station, serving the Johannesburg region.