The late DSP/Mr. Devine Asiam
A superior police officer has reportedly shot himself, raising the tally of suicides in the law enforcement agency even further.
DSP/Mr. Devine Asiam of the Tema Regional Command Courts Unit is suspected to have shot himself with a pistol yesterday morning and died shortly after he was rushed to the Police Hospital in Accra.
According to the Adjei-Kojo District Crime Officer, there was a report of a shot from the direction of the room of the deceased at Borteyman.
Police officers were immediately dispatched to the location and upon arriving at the scene they met the officer bleeding profusely from a gunshot wound around his left eye, but he was alive.
The spectacle showed signs of a self-inflicted shot, according to reports.
He was rushed to the Police Hospital where he was admitted but died shortly.
Upon returning to the room, police officers retrieved telltale items such as a blood-smeared Pietro Berretta pistol on the floor, its magazine containing four live rounds of ammunition.
Also found was a suicide note dated February 14, 2020 at about 1:30 am, but the content had not yet been made public.
The district crime officer, DSP Akrofi Ansah, and the investigator, D/PW/Sgt. Victoria Afedo, found the deceased on a stretcher in a supine position.
His body showed gunshot wounds on the chin and top of his left eye, an indication that he shot himself under his chin and the bullet exiting through the top of his left eye. Crime scene officers went to the scene as part of routine procedure in homicide matters.
Superintendent Cyprian McCarthy Zenge, 57, the Jomoro Municipal Police Commander, recently committed suicide, the outcome of which investigations had not been made public. He too shot himself in his room.
Another police officer, Const. Eugene Yelnona, also committed suicide at his duty post at Ridge in Accra recently.
The IGP/Mr. James Oppong-Boanuh, last week Friday, announced that the Police Administration was discussing with the Ghana Psychology Association on how to have them offer their services to law enforcement personnel and members of their immediate families.
He recalled the suspected ‘suicides’ of two of its personnel in less than a week, and added that the Homicide Unit of the Criminal Investigations Department was investigating the matter.
By A.R. Gomda