One suspected robber has been shot dead along the Achimota Forest stretch after he succeeded in attacking and snatching two phones from two pedestrians and running into the bush.
On 27/1/2021 at about 9:pm, suspect, now deceased, armed with knife emerged from the Achimota Forest Reserve and snatched a passerby’s phone and ran back into the forest.
He was chased by snap check duty men at the Achimota CP roundabout but he managed to escape into the forest.
The Police then came back and laid ambush around the forest. After a while, he emerged again from another side of the forest to continue his operation.
The team started monitoring him closely. Minutes later, he snatched another phone at knifepoint from a lady who alighted from a passenger vehicle and again started running back to the forest.
This time, the duty men gave him a hot chase and in an attempt to demobilise him and cause his arrest, he was hit by a bullet, and rushed to the Police Hospital for treatment but was pronounced dead on arrival. The body has been deposited at the police morgue.
Fighting robbery on that stretch has been a headache for the district, the division and the regional command.
The robbers, who pretend as prayer warriors, hide in the forest and come out late evening and early morning – rush hours – and attack their victims with offensive weapons, snatch their bags, phones, other valuables and run back into the forest.
In November last year, a woman was stabbed in the shoulder because her vehicle’s door glass was down. They took her handbag and phone away.
This prompted the command to mount the snap checkpoint and also post plain cloth police in the area in the evening and morning rush hours.
Though five arrests were made in the last quarter of last year of whom two were jailed, the problem still persists.
With the killing of the notorious robber, who, according to the duty men, had operated in the Achimota Forest enclave for many years, the robbery activities on the road along the forest stretch may subside.