The late Constable Daniel Owusu
Two men have been sentenced to life imprisonment for shooting two officers, killing one instantly and severely injuring the other at Lapaz in the Greater Accra Region in 2017.
The convicts, Kassim Munkaila aka Ekpe Macho and Abdul Rahim aka Spata, were charged with conspiracy and murder for the killing of Constable Daniel Owusu and another charge of attempted murder of Constable Ziblim Alhassan.
The two officers were on their daily community patrol duties at Abeka Lapaz on July 13, 2017, when the convicts shot them without any provocation.
Constable Ziblim Alhassan had slowed down at a traffic light intersection to allow a passerby cross when the convicts, who were on an unregistered motorbike, crossed him and shot him three times.
“One of the bullets hit his right hand and in the process, he fell down from his motorbike, bleeding profusely on the main road,” court documents indicate.
His patrol mate, Constable Daniel Owusu, who was behind him, unknowingly ran into the convicts, who shot and killed him instantly.
His body was kept at the Police Hospital Mortuary where autopsy gave the cause of death as hemorrhagic shock, severe chest injury and gunshot at close range.
The body was later released to the family for burial, while Constable Alhassan Ziblim who sustained gunshot wounds was treated and discharged.
The broad daylight shooting of the two police officers generated public uproar and reignited talks about the safety of police officers in the country. The Ghana Police Service later placed a GH¢10,000 bounty on the convicts, who went into hiding after the heinous crime.
The then Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia together with then Minister for the Interior, Ambrose Dery and the Inspector General of Police, David Asante-Apeatu and some senior police officers visited the family the late General Constable Daniel Owusu to console them in the aftermath of the shooting.
The convicts had pleaded not guilty to all three charges but were found guilty by a seven-member jury in a unanimous decision.
The court, presided over by Justice Lydia Osei Marfo, a Justice of the Court of Appeal sitting as an additional High Court judge, subsequently sentenced the two to life imprisonment in hard labour.
Kassim Munkaila Abdul Rahim fled the scene after the shooting by forcibly snatching an unregistered Hyundai Elantra saloon car from the owner. They later abandoned the stolen car at a distance when the car ran out of fuel.
The two were arrested following an intelligence-led operation, and reportedly admitted to the offence during interrogation.
The late Constable Daniel Owusu was enlisted into the Ghana Police Service on October 16, 2012, and passed out on March 8, 2013, at the Regional Police Training School, Winneba in the Central Region.
He was posted to the Community Policing Unit in the Greater Accra Region. On July 13, 2017, he was shot and killed by armed robbers at Abeka Lapaz whilst on his routine Community Patrol duties.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak