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Police and robbers vie for supremacy in Tema
Tema, July 24, Ghanadot/GNA- The Ghana Police Service and
armed robbers are fighting for space in the Tema Metropolis
as each group strives to take the upper hand in controlling
the metropolis.
The police had however defeated the armed robbers leading to
the armed robbers extending their nefarious activities to
Dawhenya, Prampram, Kpone and surrounding areas, Deputy
Commissioner of Police (DCOP) John Kudalor, Tema Regional
Police Commander said on Wednesday.
He was addressing a press conference on circumstances
leading to the police shooting and killing 33-year old Nii
Annan Darpoh alias Seidi at New Dawhenya in the early hours
of Thursday July 17.
DCOP Kudalor indicated that due to the effective control of
criminal activities in the metropolis, criminals who were
operating within the metropolis have shifted their attention
to developing areas within the Tema Region.
He said the Command would impound unregistered vehicles in
the Region from 1800 hours daily, while owners of the
vehicles would also be prosecuted as one of the measures to
flush out criminals from operating in the region.
The Tema Commander called on residents of such areas to be
on the alert of suspicious characters and strangers in
addition to providing lights in their vicinity.
Recounting circumstances leading to the shooting, DCOP
Kudalor explained that the alertness of the personnel
heightened after they had received distress calls including
a robbery and kidnapping case between the night of July 16
and dawn of July 17 from some stations and therefore
prepared against defending their lives and that of the
public.
He said four policemen from the Prampram District Police
responded to one of such calls the station received at about
0400 hours, concerning series of armed robbery attacks
around New Dawhenya.
The police who mounted an intensive search for the armed
robbers ordered the deceased and two other men wielding
machetes and sticks to lie down pointing their weapons at
them after receiving information from a victim that the said
robbers were hiding in an uncompleted house in the bush.
The Tema Commander claimed that “the deceased defied the
instructions and allegedly walked towards the police with a
machete in hand and the personnel who viewed the
non-compliance of instruction as an intended attack, acted
proactively and fired at the ankle of the deceased to maim
him.”
He added that while his colleagues were sent to the Prampram
police, Nii Darpoh was sent to the Tema General Hospital
where he died on the same day at about 1630 hours, noting
that the police was investigating the case and the personnel
who fired would be dealt with when found culpable.
Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Kwesi Ofori, Director
of Police Public Affairs, advised the public to always stay
indoors after alerting the police of robberies in their
localities, explaining that, anybody found at the scene
could be mistaken for a suspect by the police.
He also called on the media and other stakeholders to help
the police to fight crime in the country by volunteering
information and providing logistics to the police, stating
that “policing is a shared responsibility”.
Meanwhile Mr Kennedy Agyepong, Member of Parliament for
Assin Fosu and resident of Tema has donated a Mitsubishi car
to the Tema police to help improve police activities in the
metropolis.
Prior to the press conference, a student journalist who was
robbed and kidnapped by some armed robbers narrated his
ordeal to the press and stated that the attackers crossed
him with their unregistered green Joe Prisn Saloon car on
July 16 after he had cashed GH˘8,000 from Sakumono Trust
Bank.
The victim whose identity was not disclosed said the robbers
collected the money and his car from him at gun point and
ordered him to call his relatives to deliver an addition GH˘10,000
to them near the Kpone cemetery, before he would be
released.
The victim who claimed he was hit several times by the
attackers with the back of the revolver and AK47 riffle they
were holding, managed to free himself after struggling with
them.
GNA
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