2 Found Dead At Printing Press

Two people were found dead in the early hours of Tuesday, in a commercial printing house near the Kotobabi Police Station, where they were working throughout the night reportedly to meet a deadline.

Henry Laryea, 30, and Joseph Asrah, 25, are suspected to have died from suffocation caused by fumes from a power generator they had placed in the room.

The room had no openings for ventilation, apart from the front and back doors.

When the Times got to the scene yesterday at about 11:30 am, the police were conveying the bodies wrapped in blue body bags to the Police Hospital. For about two hours, there was a traffic jam on the Abavana-Kotobabi road as onlookers thronged the area to catch a glimpse of the dead bodies.

An eyewitness, Eric Martey, told the Times that the two people started work at about 1 pm on Sunday and around 6pm, they switched on a power generator when power supply from the national grid went out as a result of the load shedding. However, 10:15pm, the two people moved the generator, which was outside, to the room and locked themselves up while they were printing.

Martey said that the owner of the store only opened the door yesterday morning to find the two workers dead.

Briefing the Times later, DSP Edward Faakye-Kumi,Kotobabi District Police Commander, said that the Laryea and Asrah were working together with the owner of the printing press, Augusta Yeboah, until 10 pm last Sunday when she left them for home.

He said the two, who apparently had a deadline to meet, decided to work overnight and fearing that their power generator may be stolen, moved it to the main compound of the house.

According to Mr. Faakye-Kumi, at about 11 pm when the owner got home, she called the office and Laryea told her that the generator was taken to the compound of the house but the landlord had complained that it was making noise.

As a result, they moved it to the printing room, covered it with a box and locked the main door, leaving the back door to the store room.

Yeboah is said to have asked the two to stop the printing and concentrate on clipping the photocopies they had made, after she had been told by Laryea that the generator had overheated.

Faakye-Kumi said Yeboah came to open the store yesterday morning, only to encounter a smoke-filled room with the lights switched on and the generator running.

Asrah was found lying beside the photocopying machine and Laryea beside the generator.

Thinking that the two were sleeping, Ms Yeboa reportedly tried to wake them up, but realised their breath had ceased. She raised the alarm which attracted people to the scene and a report was made to the Kotobabi Police.