Five people held over ritual murders

Aflao, Nov. 23, GNA - The police last weekend, retrieved two dead bodies with their chest pierced near the heart with sharp implements in an advanced stage of decomposition at separate villages about 15 kilometres apart.

One of the deceased in the suspected ritual murders Kwamevi Sosu, 29, whose maggot infested body was found at Sallahkope near Agavedzi on the Denu-Keta beach road, had his legs chopped off at the knee level, his heart removed and the body partly burnt.

Despite the fact that the incidents seemed to have occurred around the same time and mode of killings similar, it is not clear whether the two cases are linked in view of the distance between the two locations where the bodies were found.

Two persons, Robert Kporha, a friend to Sosu and Agartha Agbavitor, Sosu's girlfriend are being detained by the police for questioning over his death.

The maggot infested body of the other deceased person, Dotse Savi, 39, a farmer of Agbevekope near Nogokpo on the Aflao-Accra trunk road was also found in a coconut plantation about 200 metres from his Agbevekope family home.

Three people, Cletus Kwabla, 22, Edoe Savi, 41, both brothers of Dotse and his uncle, Kwao Ameyelu, 65 are also in custody to help the police. Mr Samuel Sackitey, Aflao District Police Commander in an interview with the GNA said police were sent to the two locations following simultaneous calls last Saturday.

He said information gathered showed that Sosu in the company of Kporha left his Santokope home one evening to visit his fianc=E9e, Agartha at Sallakope but Kporha returned without the deceased until his body was found.

Mr Sackitey said it has also been established that the other deceased, Dotse also left his village on Monday, November 14, this year to visit his uncle Ameyelu, a fisherman at Adina, a fishing community, a walking distance from Sallahkope where the other body was found but failed to return.

He said Dotse had lost his father, Midao Savi and before the deceased left to visit Ameyelu his body was found on the same Saturday the funeral of Savi was being celebrated and attended by his uncle Ameyelu, whom the deceased visited about six days before the funeral celebration. Mr Sackitey said police found it intriguing that Dotse's failure to return from the visit did not bother his two brothers during their father's funeral, which was attended by their uncle, whom the deceased visited.

He said it was baffling why Ameyelu did not find out about the whereabouts of the deceased when he arrived for the funeral if really the deceased did not visit him. Mr Sackitey said following medical examinations and recommendation, both bodies have since been buried.