Takoradi kidnappings: Udoetuk Wills swerves crowd second time
There was no show at the Takoradi District Court where Samuel Udoetuk Wills, the 28-year-old Nigerian suspected to be behind the kidnapping of three girls, was supposed to appear last Tuesday.
It was the second successive day that the case was called without the suspect showing up.
Checks by the Daily Graphic, however, showed that the suspect was still being held to assist with investigations that would lead to finding the kidnapped girls.
Wills was brought before the magistrate court, presided over by Mr Michael Ampadu, on charges of escaping from lawful custody, causing unlawful damage to the police cell and resisting arrest, all of which he had pleaded not guilty to.
He was to appear before the court last Monday but to the disappointment of a large crowd that had besieged the court premises to see him, he was not brought to the court.
The case was adjourned to last Tuesday to enable the suspect to open his defence, but once again Wills was not brought to the court to the chagrin of the large crowd outside the court.
When the case was called yesterday, the police prosecutor only asked for adjournment to February 11, 2019.
Escape
Wills allegedly escaped through one of the ventilation windows of the cell in which he was being kept about 6.25 p.m. on December 30 2018, having used a hacksaw blade to cut the iron rods used to secure the windows.
On January 3, 2019, the police re-arrested him in an uncompleted building at Kansawurodo, a suburb of Sekondi/Takoradi.
At the spot of the re-arrest, the police found a dress, headgear and a pair of rubber slippers one of the kidnapped victims wore on the day she went missing.
Background
Wills was sent to court on December 24, 2018, on charges of alleged kidnapping and was remanded in police custody.
He escaped from cell on December 30, 2018, rearrested on January 3, this year and put before the court the same day and was remanded into prison custody.
He appeared before the court again on January 9 and January 16, respectively this year and was billed to reappear yesterday.
The case has since been adjourned to February 11.