Escapee prisoner nabbed with 18-year-old girlfriend

One of the three suspected armed robbers who escaped from police cells at the Tema Fishing Harbour last Saturday has been captured.

Twenty-year-old Eliasu Mohammed, a Malian, was arrested together with his 18-year-old final-year senior high school student lover at Okponglo, near Legon.

He was found having in possession of two new pump action guns and more than 20 rounds of ammunition.

Mohammed, together with two other suspects, Ebenezer Nyagbedzi and Daniel Kwame Kumi, escaped from police cells last Saturday but was arrested last Monday after he had visited a spiritualist to allegedly fortify himself.

He had earlier been arrested together with two of his colleagues following a misunderstanding over the sharing of the booty after they had robbed an expatriate of huge sums of money.

At the time of his escape last Saturday, Mohammed was on remand.

The Deputy Accra Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Christian Tetteh Yohuno, said the police mounted surveillance last Monday on hearing that he was visiting a spiritualist.

He said soon after visiting the spiritualist, Mohammed went to a hideout at Ashaiman, near Tema, to retrieve the two pump action guns and organised a new gang for another robbery expedition.

According to Mr Yohuno, Mohammed told the police that after their escape, the escapees took to different directions and he had not heard from the other two.

Mr Yohuno urged policemen manning various police counters and cells to be extra-vigilant, especially when visitors of arrested people brought in food.

He said investigations had so far established that it was the girlfriend of one of the escapees who smuggled a hacksaw blade into the cells.

He said it was that hacksaw blade which was used to cut through the metal in the ceiling to enable the suspects to escape.