Kidnap case: Negligent Policemen will be dealth with ruthlessly – Acting IGP

The Acting Inspector-General of Police(IGP), James Oppong Boahuh, has warned that any policeman found to have been negligent in the handling the  Takoradi kidnapped girls case, will be punished.

According to him, this will be after what the police refer to as “the after-action review” when the case is eventually concluded.

Families of the three kidnapped girls have called on the Police Administration to investigate a CID officer known as ‘Ametepe’ and the former District Commander for Takoradi, Peter Ofori Donkor, who they claim aided the first suspect in the case from escaping  police cells.

The families  of the three missing Takoradi girls, at a press conference in July, called for the arrest of a former District Commander for Takoradi, Peter Ofori Donkor and a CID officer known as ‘Ametepe’ to aid in investigations.

It would be recalled that the first Nigerian suspected kidnapper, Samuel Udoetuk Wills, who has been jailed for escaping from police cells, revealed during one of the court proceedings that he was aided by a police officer to escape.

The family members say after Samuel Wills was jailed for escaping from lawful custody, nothing was heard about the allegation by the Nigerian. They said they later got to know that two police officers had since been transferred from the Takoradi Divisional Police Command.

The families once again raised the concerns to the Acting IGP when he paid them a visit on Tuesday, August 13, 2019 just as they were preparing to offer blood samples to the investigative team validating the authenticity or otherwise of the human remains discovered barely two weeks ago.

The Director of Public Affairs, Ghana Police Service, ACP David Eklu who was with the IGP in the closed-door meeting with the families said that acting IGP assured to bring to book any police officer who will be found to have been careless in the discharge of his duty.

“…The concerns were raised and the IGP indicated that for every major operation there’s what we call an after-action review. So we will look at the roles the police have played. Some police officers were also commended by the families, a few of them had issues. So the IGP indicated that there’ll be an after-action review to see what went wrong. If there’s the need to punish negligence, that will be done.”