Armed robber
Police have arrested five suspected armed robbers who on the October 22, robbed passengers in three vehicles and killed one Nigerian lady, Rosaline Oguneleko on the Elubo–Samenye highway in the Western Region.
According to Superintendent John Ferguson Dzineku, Half Assini District Police Commander, those arrested have confessed that they undertook the robbery operations on October 22, 2012.
They were Charles Frimpong Abeiku, 20 from Mankessim; Kojo Ibrahim Brenya alias Lumba, 21, from Tafo Magazine in Kumasi; Kojo Anoba Faisal Abukari, 21, from Asafo in Kumasi; Mubarak Mohammed, 22, from Moshi Zongo in Kumasi and 18-year-old Osman Adam from Eyigya in Kumasi.
The police boss told DAILY GUIDE that following the robbery, police intensified their night patrols on October 24, 2012, and parked the police car at a place near the bush on the route where the robberies took place.
At about 10:00 p.m., the robbers who were in a Nissan Amira taxi with registration number AW 8062-12 passed by but did not observe the police patrol car which was almost parked in the bush along the road.
The patrol car followed the taxi, but the robbers, thinking the car following them was a commercial one, slowed down and blocked the road with their car.
As the robbers were about to alight, they realized it was a police patrol car and quickly sped off, but the police gave them a hot chase and intercepted them some two kilometers before the Ankasa Forest Reserve towards Elubo and arrested them.
The police found in the bonnet of their taxi one pump action gun, one foreign pistol with 16 rounds of bullets and a locally-manufactured pistol with 18 rounds of BB cartridges hidden in a corner.
Giving the background to the robbery, Supt Dzineku said about eight armed robbers attacked passengers on an Abidjan–Lagos bound passenger vehicle at Nyamebekyere on the Elubo-Samenye motor road in the Western Region, killed a female passenger and wounded others in three series of robberies.
The body of 31-year-old Rosaline Oguneleko, a Nigerian woman which was deposited at St. Martin de Porres Hospital at Eikwe for autopsy, was buried at Half Assini after autopsy, while those injured have been treated and discharged.
He said on October 22, 2012, at about 8:00 p.m., Driver Muftau Adenyi, 55, a Nigerian in charge of DAF bus with registration number XV 142 EKY was travelling from Abidjan towards Nigeria.
On reaching a rough portion of the road between Ankasa and Nyamebekyere villages along the Elubo–Samenye barrier motor road, the robbers with masks on their faces, numbering about eight, attacked them.
Three of them carried shot guns and others wielded machetes. They fired at the left rear tyre of the vehicle upon the driver’s resistance to open the doors to allow them entry.
They again fired at the rear windscreen, killing Rosaline Oguneleko, a 31-year-old female Nigerian passenger, instantly.
They robbed the passengers of their monies and valuables and moved to another section of the road where they stopped a Yutong bus with registration number 7776 FTO1 driven by Tidjane Koulibaly, an Ivorian with 57 passengers on board and attacked them as well.
They robbed the passengers and in the process shot one Kone Braimah, 43, an Ivorian, who sustained wounds and the pellets had to be removed at St. Martin de Porres hospital in Eikwe.
Another Benz articulated truck with registration number 894 EZO1 loaded with a quantity of Rexona soap driven by one Ouattara Adama of La Cote d’Ivoire, was also attacked by the robbers.
Unspecified amounts of money both in Ghana Cedis and CFA Francs were robbed from the victims and when the police rushed to the various scenes, they retrieved two empty shells.
The police then intensified their patrols and succeeded in arresting five of the suspected robbers, who are currently in police custody pending further investigations.
From Sam Mark Essien, Takoradi