On Saturday, policemen at Elimgbu Police Station, Eneka Road, Port Harcourt, physically assaulted and threatened to shoot a young man named Ken for coming to report his ordeal at the hands of kidnappers that night.
The Rivers State Police Command has commenced investigation into the assault of a kidnap victim by some officers after the former visited a police station in Port Harcourt, the capital city, to report the incident.
On Saturday, policemen at Elimgbu Police Station, Eneka Road, Port Harcourt, physically assaulted and threatened to shoot a young man named Ken for coming to report his ordeal at the hands of kidnappers that night.
The policemen, who initially asked the victim to provide money with which they could buy petrol in their van to visit the crime scene, resorted to physical abuse after the complainant told them that it was wrong to demand money from him simply because he asked them to do their jobs.
Ken and three of his friends were returning home to Rumuokorisi in Port Harcourt from a burial at around 7:00 pm that fateful day when four gunmen blocked the Lexus 330 SUV they were riding.
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The armed men fired several shots into the air to scare people around the scene away before whisking the four youths in the vehicle to an unknown destination.
The SUV ran out of petrol while they were led by the kidnappers on Igbo Etche Road, one of the most dangerous locations in Rivers State.
One of the gunmen left the scene on a motorbike with one of the guys in the vehicle named Samuel while Ken and two others were locked up inside the car while two of the three remaining kidnappers went in search of petrol.
Ken and his two friends managed to overpower the gunman watching guard over them and found their way to Elimgbu Police Station.
It was in the process of seeking help from policemen they met at the place that the young man was beaten and threatened with a gun.
Embarrassed by news of the incident exclusively published by SaharaReporters on Monday, the Rivers State Police Command leadership on Wednesday summoned the Divisional Police Officer and two of his men to appear before a fact-finding panel headed by a senior female officer at the headquarters on Moscow Road.
Though the DPO didn’t make it to the meeting, one of the two policemen, who honoured the invitation, admitted to being one of those responsible for the assault on Ken on the night he came to report his kidnap and lucky escape at Elimgbu Police Station.
The two policemen were questioned and verbally reprimanded for close to one hour at the state command over the assault on Ken before being allowed to leave the place.
SaharaReporters gathered that even though some senior police officers in Rivers were working hard to ensure that the matter did not get to the table of the state police commissioner, the errant policemen may not escape punishment as the incident is said to have embarrassed the leadership of the state command.
The policemen involved in the matter will face further disciplinary action next Tuesday where they could either be demoted or dismissed from the Force as a result of their unprofessional conduct.
The spokesperson for the Rivers State Police Command, Nnamdi Omoni, when contacted over the issue, said, “They will be dealt with accordingly.”
SaharaReporters further gathered that during a visit to the DPO of Elimgbu Police Station on Wednesday afternoon over the matter, Ken was offered some cash for him to run some medical tests following the assault on him by the policemen and bring the result to the state command headquarters to aid the ongoing investigation.