Richard Appiah
We are lost for words as are other Ghanaians about the Dracula episode which played out in Abesim in the Bono Region. The foregone headline captures the story of Abesim.
The thriller, soaked in blood does not belong here. It belongs to Dracula bestsellers in the imagination of writers specializing in such subjects.
Those hearing the story for the first time would have definitely squirmed in their chairs wondering whether they were in a wonderland.
Twenty-eight-year-old Richard Appiah who is at the centre of the unusual serial killing as it were has a lot to tell the State about what he has been up to in the past few months.
His age, 28, adds to the wonderment and compelling the curious to scratching their heads for answers which would never come anyway.
To have killed innocent kids the way he did and stocking their bodies in a fridge suggests that he was either cooking and eating human flesh or selling parts of the murdered persons. Whichever of the foregone was his pastime is a matter of curiosity.
Even as the law enforcement agents investigate the subject curious citizen will not stop posing questions considering the fact that the young man has no business getting involved in such uncanny and inexplicable pastime.
Many have wondered whether like the other ongoing murder conundrums being investigated by the police this too will ‘mark time’ with no end in sight for its closure.
We are however, excited that the Dr. George Akuffo Dampare, the acting IGP, has taken a trip to Abesim where he commiserated with the bereaved family and above all demanded that the CID headquarters’ homicide supports the investigation.
Without a closure to the subject which would only come when the investigations are expedited and the culprits brought to book, the bereaved families would languish in mental agony.
The involvement of a psychologist to assuage the cognitive pain of the parents of the murdered kids while it is a wonderful gesture should be supported with an expedited management.
One lesson stands tall in this matter. Public and police cooperation pays and as evidenced in the Abisem case under review led to the quick arrest of the key suspect in the episode.
We wish to repeat for the umpteenth time that we should all be our brothers’ keepers in the communities in which we live.
But for the curiosity of a resident in Alaska, the suburb in which the suspect lives, the speed with which Richard Appiah was identified and arrested would not have come about.
With possible ‘cannibals’ in our midst it is only wise for all to be security conscious not only about robbers but possible Draculas and to alert the security agents where necessary.