CATTLE RUSTLER, INFORMANT ESCAPE FROM CUSTODY...Police given10-days ultimatum to produce them (PAGE 24, MIRROR)

From Zakaria Alhassan, Tamale.

THE alleged complicity by some policemen on duty at the Walewale police station has led to the escape of a suspected cattle rustler and a teenager, described by the police as an informant, from custody.
The Northern Regional Police Command has, therefore, issued an ultimatum to the three policemen involved to recapture the suspected rustler within 10 days or face punitive action.
Even though the command has not disclosed what measures it would take against the three policemen, a police source at Tamale said it could include a reduction in their ranks.
According to the Public Relations Officer of the Command in Tamale, Inspector Albert Johnson, the three policemen whose names were not given, failed to place the suspect, Yakubu Dramani, in custody properly, as demanded by their profession, leading to his escape.
He explained that on April 29, this year, one Nuhu Issaka, a resident of Bawku in the Upper East Region, in the company of Musah Ali from Gbimsi, near Walewale in the Northern Region reported the loss of 29 cattle from a kraal at Gbimsi.
Inspector Johnson said Issaka mentioned Yakubu Dramani as the one he suspected had stolen the cattle.
However, Dramani denied the charges when he was arrested later and interrogated, but expressed his preparedness to lead the police to the house of the person he claimed was actually behind the theft.
The PRO said at about 10a.m. the same day, the complainant, in the company of the police investigator and the suspect, all left to town for further investigations.
They, however, failed to locate the supposed suspect Dramani claimed had stolen the cattle but rather came back with a 15-year-old Fulani boy, whose name was not given and who volunteered to help locate the alleged suspect after Dramani had described the person to him.
‘‘But contrary to professional police standards, the boy who had not committed any offence was handcuffed together with the suspect and placed in custody by the investigator,’’ Inspector Johnson said.
He said when Dramani later complained of hunger, one of the policemen on duty at the charge office asked a female colleague to go and buy food for the suspect after which the policeman left the station.
‘‘When the female officer returned to the station with the food, she realised that the charge office was empty and the suspect and informant had also escaped with the handcuff,’’ the officer indicated.