Hunchback killers arrested

Four persons who allegedly murdered a man and removed the 'hump' at his back, appeared before a Sekondi High Court on Wednesday on charges of conspiring to commit murder and murdering 65-year-old cripple Baba Yakubu Musa at Bibiani.

The accused are two butchers, a businessman and a tailor.

They are said to have abducted and brutally killed the deceased while wearing black masks on the night July 22, 2008 when they allegedly strangled the hunchback with cable wire and deftly sliced the hunch off his back with a sharpened knife.

They are Seidu Apana Nuhu, a selfstyled businessman resident at Accra, Kumasi and Bibiani; Abdul Rahman Mohammed alias Taller, a butcher at Bibiani; Halidu Musa alias Bon, also a butcher at Bibiani; and Haruna Abass, a tailor and nephew of the deceased.

The court remanded them to reappear on March 9.
Prosecuting, Mr. Samuel Patrick Akufo, Senior State Attorney, said the deceased lived in a kiosk near the Bibiani abattoir where he sold cola nuts, reared sheep and goats nearby.

He said Musa also had a house at Ataakrom at Bibiani but he seldom slept there.

At about 9:00 pm on July 22, 2008, the victim went to bed in the kiosk. While he was asleep, Abass knocked on the door of the kiosk and identified himself.

Akufo said when Musa opened the door, Abass entered with two men wearing black masks.

He explained that they covered victim's head with his bed sheet and tied his neck with a cable wire.

About five minutes later, Abass and the masked men bundled Musa and carried him to a red pick-up belonging to victim, which was parked near the kiosk and drove away.

He said on July 23, Abass went to work at his tailoring shop near the abattoir and went to the kiosk to greet his uncle and enquire his condition of health as he usually did.

According to Akufo, the deceased who was also known as Busanga, was not around but his walking stick and the clothes he wore the previous night were found in the kiosk.

After all searching efforts proved futile, some people raised alarm that Busanga was abducted by certain strange persons in the night.

At about 10:45 am, Abass reported the disappearance of Busanga to the Bibiani Police. On July 25, the Police received a report that a lifeless body concealed in a fertilizer sack had been dumped in a bush near a refuse dump at New Compound.

He said the complainant led the Police to the site and when the Police opened the sack, they found the body to be that of an old man.

The cable wire was tied around the neck of the body which was in an advanced stage of decomposition.

Abass identified the body as Busanga but noticed with horror that the hunchback had been removed.

On August 11, the Police arrested Nuhu, Mohammed and Musa based on a tip-off about their involvement in the murder but all three accused denied any knowledge of the crime during interrogation.

On August 29, Abass was also arrested in the course of investigations.