Police Recover Corpses of Four Officers Killed by Militants in Delta

Sylvester Idowu in Warri

The corpses of four policemen, who were allegedly killed by militants penultimate Monday in one of the creeks in Delta State have been recovered by a search party comprising security agents and locals.

The decomposing bodies were retrieved on Wednesday along the Benin river axis of Delta State were recovered along with their patrol boat after Aruwun community.

The corpses of the policemen, simply identifiied as Aghoro who was the commander of the team, Sagay, Andrew and Mejer, were deposited at both Sapale and Warri General Hospital morgue.

It was learnt also that the bullet riddled patrol boat that was sunk by the militants was recovered and taken to Abigborodo community under the care of soldiers at the military post.

Heavily armed militants had allegedly invited the policemen led by Aghoro to come and collect money to pave way for them to carry out their illegal bunkering activities.

It was reliably learnt that against advice from well meaning persons not to proceed to the area, Aghoro embarked on the trip with the only patrol boat at their Sapele Marine Police Unit with four others and ventured into the sea at about 2:30a.m.without a back-up patrol boat.
Usually there used to be a back-up patrol boat whenever there is an operation as ordered by the police authority.

It was gathered that on sighting a boat on the sea and having identified that they were the persons invited, the militants moved closer to the boat and opened fire on the officers killing four of them with one, Mr. Ugbo swimming to safety with bullet wounds and currently recuperating at the Sapele General Hospital.

THISDAY learnt that the Sapele Unit Commander has been under arrest since the incident.

Delta State Police Public Relations Officer, Andrew Aniamaka, refused to pick the calls put across to him for confirmation of the incident.
The state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Zanna, later confirmed the recovery of the bodies but refused to give details of the incident.