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15.12.2004 General News

CID Dismisses Kidnapping Claim

15.12.2004 LISTEN
By Daily Graphic

Graphic -- The Criminal Investigations Department(CID)of the Ghana Police Service has stated that it has not been able to gather any evidence to substantiate the alleged kidnapping of the Joy FM correspondent in Ho. The CID said it was also suspicious about how the alleged kidnapping of Ms Efuah Emefa Dzansi-Asamoah, 26, was broadcast live on radio.

The department said it was also not happy about the role played by Capt (retd) George Nfojoh, NDC MP-elect for Ho Central. The Director of the CID, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Mr David Asante-Apeatu, in an interview in Accra yesterday,wondered why a retired army officer, former DCE and astute politician should refuse to report a case of kidnapping or even hand over exhibits he found at the scene to the police.

Even though Ms Dzansi-Asamoah claimed she was injected by her assailants on the buttocks,the Senior Medical Officer at the Volta Regional Hospital,Dr Nyamuame, who examined the victim, was emphatic that “no site of injection was discovered”, the CID boss stated.

“It sounds very strange that the victim's assailants who had planned to harm her did not seize her mobile phone before the deed,” the CID Director stressed. Mr Asante-Apeatu said looking at the physique of the victim and the description of her assailants as narrated by her, she could not have struggled with them.

On the victim's claim that she was injected on the buttocks, Mr Asante-Apeatu said he could not fathom how the needle did not bend and none of the exhibits fell in the taxi, despite her alleged struggle with the assailants, but were all left at the scene, arranged on top of a dark polythene bag.

The director could not reconcile how the victim, who alleged that she was pushed into a narrow gutter 61 centimetres wide and a depth of 76 centimetres, did not sustain any injury or bruises.Mr Asante-Apeatu said the “unconscious” victim could not have received a telephone call, let alone give it to the taxi driver to receive the call for direction to a particular hospital.

The first witness to arrive on the scene also saw Ms Dzansi-Asamoah chatting on the cell phone, the CID boss said.He said the exhibits, a syringe with needle and a small plastic bottle with some liquid had been forwarded to the Ghana Standards Board for examination to establish the type of drug used by the alleged attackers.

He said the result of the examination would enable the police to determine the next line of action.Meanwhile, the CID is making efforts to retrieve from the victim the tape she recorded during the attack and Mr Raymond Archer, a correspondent of the Chronicle, would be contacted for the recorded tape of the incident as alleged by the victim. Following reports of the kidnap, the CID Director dispatched a team of policemen to Ho to assist the local police to investigate the incident.

The team proceeded to Ho, where the acting Regional Crime Officer, ASP C. M. Kpimbi,briefed them that on December 12,at about 10 p.m. they heard on Joy FM that its regional correspondent had been kidnapped by unidentified persons in a taxi cab, dumped in a gutter near the State Fishing Corporation in Ho, while she was unconscious, and had been rescued by a good Samaritan who sent her to the Volta Regional Hospital for treatment.

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