Commandant reacts as family Family of murdered girl accuse police of extortion

The family of a young lady identified as Miss Ogochukwu Viola Anele, who was allegedly murdered in Imo State has accused the State Police Command of a cover up and reluctance in prosecuting the suspected culprit who is currently in police custody.

According to the distraught father, Cosmas Anele, Ogochukwu, a graduate from the Imo State University, who worked with a payment company, was killed on Tuesday but all efforts to get the police to investigate the murder and prosecute the suspect has been abortive even after the father, a retiree, was forced to pay the sum of N60,000 to the police to take him to the murder scene and the mortuary his daughter’s corpse was deposited in.

Narrating his ordeal in a statement on Saturday, Mr Anele said all efforts by the family to get the police to swing into action has been met with a brick wall.

He lamented that the action of the police had doubled the pains of the family.

Mr. Anele, a resident of Umudagu, Mbieri, narrated that Ogochukwu, his second daughter and a graduate from the Imo State University, who worked with a payment company, did not return home penultimate Tuesday.

He said that Ogochukwu had earlier in the day, at about 2 pm, communicated with her mother on the telephone and assured her that she would be back.

“She usually returned home at 6 pm”, he said. But on that fateful day, she failed. She could not make it home. That was the beginning of heartache for her family.

They kept calling her telephone line which rang out until it stopped ringing.

The next morning, her distraught father left home and went searching. He reported a case of a missing girl at the nearest police station.

He said he also took his search to the office of the Department of State Services (DSS) hoping that his daughter may be among some persons said to have been detained at the place.

When he could not find her there. Mr. Anele said he was on his way to the Police Station on Mbaise Road (Fire Service) when his other kids called to inform him that someone had responded to a call made to Ogochukwu’s phone.

The call came from the Police Station at Iho, in Ikeduru local government area of the state. That was when his fear heightened. He wondered how she ended up at faraway Iho. So, he raced down.

That call was the beginning of the reality that Mr. Anele and his family now live with. As he explained, he was directed to go back to the State Criminal Investigations Department where the news of the murder of his daughter was mistakenly broken to him by the officer in charge when he asked “are you the father of the deceased girl?”

That was how Mr. Anele got to know that his daughter, Ogochukwu, was gone, not as dictated by her maker, but as forced on her by a man in whose house her blood was spilled.

Read also:Police officer kills mistress, self in Kwara

News of the fate that befell Ogochukwu broke her father. He was lost for words. However, he managed to ask to see her body to actually confirm it was her. In this state of utter vulnerability, the police pounced like hyenas on a carcass.

Mr. Anele said, the police demanded N60,000 before they would lead him to the scene of the crime and to the morgue. N60,000? Yes, N60,000! He tried to strike a bargain – N30,000? N40,000?, N50,000? But they refused and insisted on N60,000”.

Eager to get into details of the fate that befell his daughter, Mr. Anele said he grudgingly made a transfer. Then, the doors opened. He was led out to a house where all he saw was blood everywhere.

He broke down further and cried. It was the blood of his daughter wastefully spilled all over the floor. It was at this point that he was made to know that the man, who accompanied them on the trip, was the occupant of the room.

Indeed, he was the alleged murderer. He had no explanation to make. Afterward, Anele was led to see her remains at the mortuary.

This was how Mr. Anele eventually confirmed that his daughter, who left for work two days earlier, and promised her mother at about 2 pm, that she would be back home that evening, and will never return to them again.

Mr. Anele was made to attend an autopsy on the body of his daughter. He had no medical or legal representative at the autopsy.

But, according to him, the suspect came along with a medical representative at an autopsy that was conducted by a government pathologist. Mr. Anele now suspects clandestine moves to cover up the alleged murder and deny his murdered daughter justice.

The question is: why would the Police demand, and collect, N60,000 from a grieving father who is yet to even see the body of his allegedly murdered daughter?

What the pensioner seeks is to get to the root of how his daughter ended up murdered in the man’s house.

However, the family say the hurdle the face in getting the answers to the death or the daughter seems to be the police which seems more focused on making as much money as they can from the process than providing the grieving family a shoulder to lean on.

However, the State Police Command, has denied the allegations by the Anele family, describing the accusation as false and unfounded.

The Commandant of the State Police Scorpion Squad and Monitoring Unit, Mike Abattam, who spoke to Ripples Nigeria on the telephone, described the allegations of extortion as ridiculous and far-fetched.

“I can state categorically that the allegation is not true. It is false and baseless as far as the police is concerned. This is a murder case we are talking about. It is a capital offence.

“There is no way such a case will be reported to the police and the police will not take action. Why would the police demand for money before investigating a murder case? It is far-fetched like I said earlier.

“What I will advise the family to do is to go back to the station they initially made the report and tell the DPO to contact me or the Commissioner of Police and the case will be taken up from there.

“But to accuse the police of extortion in such a case is false,” the Commander said.

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