Police officer kills herself in Upper East

Residents of Garu in the Garu-Tempane District of the Upper East Region have been hit with the news of a police officer who took her life on Monday.

The deceased, 31-year-old Constable Peace Agbemafo is reported to have shot and killed herself with an AK 47 assault rifle, behind closed doors on Monday afternoon when she was supposed to be on guard duty at the GN Bank branch in the town.

The manager of the bank, after no police officer had reported for duty from dawn till around 10:00am, reportedly placed a call to the Garu-Tempane Police Station, expressing worry about the absence of police security at the bank. 

The situation prompted a search that led to her body being found lying on the floor at her residence, soaked in a pool of blood, that spurted from her head after she supposedly shot through the right side of her neck around 1400 hours GMT.

According to reports, she was motionless but still holding the AK 47 assault rifle when police officers, hours after she had pulled the trigger, forced the door open. Two empty shells, a knife and a rope tied to the ceiling were found during a police inspection of the room.

 Confirming the incident, Abdul-Aziz Ayaaba of Quality FM at Garu, stated “I went to the scene with my manager. We tried to speak to the police commander but he was very busy putting things in order here and there. We heard that, instead of reporting for duty at the bank, she went into her room, locked the door, turned the volume on her television set very high and shot herself in the throat and the bullet appeared from the centre of the head”. 

“There was a girl who used to go her for food. They live apart but are both from Volta region. The girl should be among the final-year students who still go to school during these holidays to prepare for the BECE. The girl returned from school on that Monday and went to the house for food as usual but only to find the door locked from inside. Monday happened to be a market day in Garu. Everybody was out of the area to do business at the market. They would have heard the sound of the gun if they [had been] around”, he told Starr FM.