2 Cops, 3 others arrested - 7 So far in police grip
The police have arrested five more persons, including two police officers, as part of investigations to unmask the people behind the latest police recruitment scam.
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The latest arrests bring to seven the total number of persons so far arrested in connection with the fraud.
The five suspects include Amos Brown, 40, a radio presenter; General Corporal Gideon Sarpong of the Visibility Unit, Takoradi; PW Constable Ruth Agyiri, 27, Central Police Station, Koforidua.
The rest are Pastor Paul Danso from Tarkwa and Richard Harrison, 30. The two who were arrested earlier are Alifa Adams, alias Abass, a 27-year-old unemployed, and Aisha Boku Asumda, 36.
Police Determined
The Director General in Charge of Press and Public Affairs Directorate, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Reverend David Nenyi Ampah-Benin, who briefed the press in Accra yesterday, said the police were determined to get to the bottom of the scam as soon as possible.
He said a six-member task force headed by the commandant of the Police Academy, DCOP Mr Bright Oduro, had been charged to ensure that every single person behind the fraud was brought to book.
He said the intelligence apparatus had been activated and had already started yielding results with the arrest of the five persons at various locations in the country.
Enlistment
DCOP Ampah-Benin said Amos Brown, who was arrested on March 4, 2015 in Takoradi, had allegedly collected various sums of money from about 40 people in Takoradi area under the pretext of helping them to be enlisted in the police service.
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He said when Pastor Danso was arrested at Tarkwa Atuabo for collecting various sums of money from people in Atuabo and its environs to get them enlisted, he mentioned the name of General Corporal Sarpong as the one who directed him to collect the money.
General Reforms
According to him, Harrison and PW Constable Agyiri were arrested at Adentan and Koforidua respectively for collecting money from people to get them enlisted.
The Director General emphasised that the general reforms taking place in all facets of the service could be assigned for why all these successes were being chalked up.
He said very stringent measures were put in place in the previous recruitment exercise where even the police hospital was moved to the training schools for the medical examination.
Vetting Reinforced
“Additionally vetting was reinforced leading to the elimination of persons with questionable characters entering the service...but for all these measures some of these people could have found themselves into the service through the backdoor,” he said.
DCOP Ampah-Benin assured Ghanaians that the recruitment procedure had been fine-tuned and was going to be even more stringent in the coming years.
Victims of Scam
He urged all victims of police recruitment scam to report to the nearest police station or the CID headquarters in Accra to assist in investigations.
He reiterated that the police service was currently not embarking on any recruitment exercise, “so people should be wary of persons who will approach them to make recruitment offers to them”.
“Persons found culpable in this shameful act irrespective of their status in society would be duly processed for court to face the full rigours of the law,” DCOP Ampah-Benin added.