Car snatcher arrested

A suspected criminal, Abdullah Sadiq, is back in police custody barely five months after he was released in connection with a robbery attack on a gospel musician, Obaapa Christy.

The 32-year-old man who was released following Obaapa Christy’s withdrawal of the case was arrested by the police on October 3, 2015 after he had allegedly led a gang to snatch a car at gunpoint.

The other members of the gang are on the run.

Breakdown vehicle

Briefing journalists, the Accra Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police Mr Christian Yohuno, said about 11 p.m. on October 6, 2015, the victim (name withheld) was attending a funeral in Berekum from Accra when his Chrysler Pacifica 4x4 vehicle broke down at Tantra Hill.

While the complainant was fixing a leakage in the car, Mr Yohuno said, three men armed with pistols jumped from an Isuzu 4x4 vehicle, with registration number GW 1313 - W, and ordered him and other occupants of the car to surrender their valuables and the ignition key.

“After subjecting them to thorough search and robbing them of their valuables, the robbers left their Isuzu and sped off with the Chrysler Pacifica 4x4,” he said.

Through the swift intervention of the police, Mr Yohuno said, Sadiq, believed to be the leader of the gang, was arrested at his residence at Ofankor where some of the victims’ belongings were retrieved.

The items found included an iPhone charger, two wristwatches, liquor which was to be used for the funeral rites.  A substance suspected to be Indian hemp was also found.

The police, he said, in their preliminary investigations, found that Sadiq was among a five-member gang that had been arrested in 2010 and remanded in prison custody for robbing Obaapa Christy, then known as Christiana Love.

Sadiq was granted bail five months ago when Obaapa Christy failed to turn up in court.