2 fugitives nabbed at Bongo with pump action gun

Two armed robbers who allegedly robbed a Chinese mining firm at Asankragwa in the Western region and disappeared after the crime have been captured in the Bongo District of the Upper East region.

The Bongo District Police Command told Starr News a pump action gun was found on the suspects during a raid on their hideout Tuesday. The two suspects, Michael Asampana Awinpanga, 25, and Sam Ameriga, 26, are said to be employees of the Chinese mining firm who reportedly owns the retrieved gun.

They purportedly robbed the company of some amount of gold ore and ran away with the stolen goods and the gun to Balungu, their hometown in the Bongo District. The Bongo District Police Command, upon a tipoff, raided their hiding place and rounded them up. The Bongo District Police Commander, ASP Paul A. Ankan, said the police could not retrieve the stolen gold ore because the suspects had sold it in Kumasi in the Ashanti region.

“When I took over in June [2015], this place was peaceful. All of a sudden these miscreants entered our enclave and within the space of a month about 10 motorcycles would be snatched. They don’t even snatch the motorbike to leave you to go scot-free. They maim and kill! By the grace of God, we have them together with the pump action gun. Who knows, maybe they were the people using that gun to torment our innocent citizens here,” the commander said.

ASP Ankan also fired a stern warning at criminals in Ghana, saying there is no hiding place for them.

“My warning, which goes to the criminals, is that they should think they would commit crime somewhere, go and run and hide without being noticed. Ghana Police is on course. You can commit crime down south there, run back to the north, we shall arrest you. In the same way, if you commit crime here and you run down south, you will be arrested. You will surely be arrested,” he warned.

As of the time Starr News visited the Bongo District Police Station, relatives of one of the suspects, Awinpanga, had surrounded the premises of the police station to plead with the law to temper justice with mercy. His mother was in tears because Michael is her only son. Even the eyes of the women who stood by her to console her were laced with tears. The suspects, in the words of the police commander, must go back to the Western region where they broke the law to face the law.

“Now, we are planning as to how to send them back to Asankragwa to face the full rigours of the law,” the commander told Starr News as Awinpanga’s relatives wept at the forecourt of the police station.