Robbers Strike Again

ARMED robbers are fast changing their focus of attack to outwit the police in their effort to clamp down on their criminal activities.

Within the past 14 days the attack has shifted from filling stations to Forex bureaux and business centre, travellers on the highway and now the latest attack is at a guest house.

The armed robbers, numbering three, last Saturday attacked two foreigners at the Golden Lemon Guest House at Tesano in Accra and made away with their personal belongings.

The robbers, believed to be in their thirties and armed with pistols, targeted an Indian businessman who had arrived in the country a few hours earlier and a middle-aged German.

They managed to get away with $3,000 official documents, a lap-top computer, mobile phone, three international credit cards, passports and airline tickets of the two men.

It is strongly believed that the robbers trailed the Indian from the Kotoka International Airport.

Narrating how it all happened to the Graphic in Accra yesterday, Mr Samuel Darfour, a receptionist at the guest house, said on Saturday evening at about 5.30 p.m., the Indian businessman, whom he named only as Ramesh, arrived at the hotel to book a room.

He said whilst he was giving him a form to fill in, two men entered the reception and enquired if they could also get a room.

Mr Darfour said he told them that there was no room and they left but returned shortly afterwards armed with pistols and ordered those at the reception to lie on the ground and raise their hands or else they will be shot.

After everyone had surrendered, one of the robbers who was outside the reception area, came inside and collected the luggage of the Indian.

Another guest, a middle-aged German, who was in the reception at the time of the attack, was also robbed of his bag which contained his passport, air ticket and an unspecified amount of money.

The robbers then made away with their booty in a white saloon car with registration number GR 9008 P which was parked a few meters away from the hotel.

An eyewitness, Mr Ebenezer Somia, said the act, which took place in about five minutes, was so carefully carried out that no one suspected that something was going on.

He was sure the robbers followed the Indian from the airport since they did not take any property of the hotel, neither did they enter any of the rooms.

Mr Somia added that nobody was hit or manhandled and no shots were fired.

Staff of the hotel on their part expressed concern about the attitude of the Tesano Police, under whose jurisdiction the case falls.

They alleged that they made a report to the police immediately after the incident but it took almost two hours for the police to respond to their call although the hotel is only a few meters away from the police station.

According to a Joy FM report, the car used in the robbery was earlier seen around Laterbiokorshie with the occupants, described as hardened criminals.

The Police have mounted an intensive search for the armed robbers.

In the case of the highway robbery, attackers who numbered about six, last Thursday night attacked travellers at Gomoa Antseadze on the Accra-Mankessim road and robbed them of monies and other valuable items they were carrying.

The police at Apam told the Ghana News Agency that at 9.45 p.m., the Ghana National Fire Service personnel at Apam Junction informed them that armed robbers had blocked the road near Antseadze and were robbing travellers of their belongings.

Corporal Godwin Mortey said before the police reached the scene, the robbers had vanished.

He said they saw a Nissan Urvan mini-bus with registration number GR 9734P loaded with pineapples, which had the front tyres, deflated.

He said Mr Kofi Yeboah, the driver, and Miss Rose Manu, a pineapple seller at the Kaneshie Market who narrated their ordea, said when they got to the spot on their way to Accra, all of a sudden, the front tyres of their vehicle deflated and when they came down to examine what had happened, six men emerged from the bush carrying dangerous weapons and attacked them.

“We were ordered to surrender all monies on us and when they were not satisfied with what they got from us, the robbers hit us with an implement and we started bleeding,” they said.

Corporal Mortey said the injured driver and the trader were taken to a clinic at Mankessim for treatment.

He said according to the victims, some travellers had earlier suffered the same fate.