Kumasi murder suspects arrested
The Director-General of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, Commissioner of Police (COP) Mr Prosper Agblor, has said that the perpetrators of all but one of the four murders that hit the Ashanti Region in recent times have been apprehended.
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He said that was done through the collaborative effort of the Ashanti Regional Police Command, the Accra Regional Police Command and the Homicide Squad at the CID Headquarters.
Mr Prosper Agblor said so far 17 suspects had been arrested in connection with the murder of Kwadwo Asamoah, alias Gauzes; Prince Opoku Anto and Joe Edusah Ayison, with the unknown assailant who murdered the fourth victim, Isaac Turkson, a teacher, yet to be apprehended.
Briefing the press in Accra yesterday, Mr Agblor indicated that those murders had created an atmosphere of insecurity in the Kumasi metropolis, culminating in a section of the residents, including the media, tagging the murders as serial murders, while others referred to them as contract killings.
He said Asamoah’s death resulted from gangsterism, Anto and Ayison were murdered by armed robbers, while Turkson was murdered by an acquaintance to settle a personal score.
Explaining the circumstances leading to the murders, the CID boss said Asamoah was a member of a gang of thugs and in December 2012 he and other accomplices shot and inflicted wounds on a member of a rival gang and they went into hiding thereafter.
He said Asamoah, however, resurfaced in May 2013 and was lured to a drinking spot by members of the rival gang and murdered, together with a man called Victor Okra who did not belong to any of the gangs but was having a drink at the bar and witnessed the whole incident.
Mr Agblor said Anto, a National Service person resident in Kumasi, went to the Jack City Pub at Dechemso with friends to have fun and while there a group of five armed robbers attacked the joint and robbed patrons of their mobile phones and an unspecified amount of money. When the deceased refused to hand over his mobile phone, he was shot in the head by the robbers.
He asserted that Ayison was a security man on duty at the Assfood Court Hotel in the Kumasi metropolis and was attacked by a group of armed robbers who shot him dead and stole a laptop which was on the desk at the reception.
Regarding the recent murder of Turkson, a teacher and postgraduate student, the Director-General indicated that on July 4, 2013, the deceased was studying in his room at Akotoso near Aboabo in Kumasi when an unidentified person visited him and they were heard having discussions which later generated into a heated argument. He was shot in the process by the unknown assailant.
He asked members of the public, especially residents of Kumasi, to go about their daily activities while observing personal security, and assured them that there was no cause for alarm.
“The Police Administration, for its part, has adopted policies aimed at enhancing security in the country and one such policy is the visibility patrols,” Mr Agblor said.
By Mary Mensah/Ghana
