A civil rights group, Rule of Law Accountability Advocacy Centre (RULAAC), has called on the Edo State Commissioner of Police to check abuses and crimes by police officers in the State, especially those operating at the Benin bypass.
A statement signed by the group’s Executive Director, Okechukwu Nwanguma, narrated the harrowing experience witnessed by Mr. Christian Njoku, MD, EARTH LTD., Lagos, in the hands of these police officers.
According to the statement, on Thursday, December 3, Mr. Njoku was heading from Lagos to the Southeast. “At about 9 am, he ran into a Police checkpoint at Benin bypass. The police officers flagged him down and requested for the documents of the two vehicles he was going to deliver to the owners, and he gave them the vehicle documents.
“He informed RULAAC that after examining the documents, the policeman who collected the documents from him, told him that the tinted glass permit he had was not the original copy because someone registered the vehicle for the owner, and that the owner did not physically appear in the office for capture.
“They therefore demanded N50,000 for each of the two vehicles, totaling N100,000 for them to release him to go.
“He said because he could not provide the money, they detained him,” adding, “not even the intervention of a Deputy Commissioner of Police who spoke to them and pleaded with them to let the man go could sway them.”
The statement further noted that, “they held him from 9am until 2pm when the man was able to muster N15,000 which they collected from him and released him.
“He gave the identities of some of the rogue officers as ‘one star ranking officer with name Adelusi with initials U or A; Inspector Hilary whose surname was covered and Sergeant Friday Okhuoya’.
“He stated that in his four to five hours with them at the checkpoint, ‘what I saw was real robbery. Police is not getting better. I even forgot a photocopy of my drivers’ licence with them’.
“He forwarded a photo of their patrol vehicle with no number plate.”
RULAAC urged the Edo CP to fish out these rogue officers, recover from them the money they extorted from the innocent man and mete out appropriate disciplinary actions to them for the discreditable conduct.
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