2 Robbers Gunned Down

The guuned down robbers. Inset: some of their weapons

A POLICE patrol team from the Tema Regional Police Command has shot and killed two members of a suspected armed robbery gang and arrested seven others around the Kpone Barrier yesterday.

This followed a fierce gun battle between the police patrol team and the suspected armed robbers.

The robbers, who were mostly of Fulani extraction, according to the Tema Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner Of Police (DCOP) Maxwell Atigane, had hired a Hyundai mini bus to transport them to Dawa to attend a wedding ceremony a day before their encounter with the police team.

Addressing a press conference in Tema yesterday, DCOP Atigane said the driver of the mini bus, unaware of their motives, drove the gang from Ashaiman towards Dawa when the patrol team, which had been monitoring their activities upon intelligence information from the police, ordered them to stop.

He stated that the gang declined to stop and realizing that the patrol team was about to close in on them, they opened fire on the police, compelling the security agency to retaliate.

 Two of the suspected robbers were killed and they were yet to be identified.

DCOP Atigane noted that about a week ago, his office got intelligence information that a group of armed robbers from various towns outside Tema and Ashaiman had planned to meet at Ashaiman to plan robberies on the Accra-Aflao road.

According to him, the activities of the gang were closely monitored until Thursday when nine of them, mostly Fulanis, were spotted in a Hyundai mini bus heading towards Aflao.

Two of them were subsequently killed in a fierce gun battle with the police after declining to stop when they were ordered to do so.

Apart from three members of the gang, who were believed to be Ghanaian, Togolese and Beninoise, the rest of them were believed to be of Fulani extraction.

DCOP Atigane mentioned the names of the Fulanis as Shehu Umani, 20, Mohammed Ali Ibrahim, 21, Bukari Amadu, 32, and Ali Mohammed, 21.

The police chief mentioned the rest as Ali Umaru and Yibo Ali, and added that a search on them shortly after their arrest revealed an SB shotgun, a locally manufactured gun, 18 BB cartridges, nine '9' MM live ammunitions, four mobile phones, two torchlights, a knife and a wrist watch.

He appealed to members of the public not to hesitate to contact the police with information on persons they suspected as having engaged in criminal conduct in their communities.

He denied that the identities of informants were always disclosed to criminals by some policemen.

Bodies of the deceased armed robbers, he said, would be sent to the morgue of the Police Hospital in Accra while the arrested person would be arraigned, the police chief said.

 From Razak Mardorgyz Abubakar, Tema