LAGOS NOVEMBER 16TH (URHOBOTODAY)-Two yet-to-be-identified police corporals have snuffed life out of a truck assistant in Warri, Delta State over an alleged attempt by the deceased to steal their uniforms.
The victim, identified as Amos Nsikak, hailed from Ekpene Ikpam Neit in Niet Ibom Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom.
Nisikak, 28 years old, was allegedly felled by bullets fired at him at close range from AK 47 rifles in November 4 by the two cops whose identity is now being largely shielded by the Nigeria Police, Delta State command.
The deceased was residing in the same two-storey building with the mobile policemen at number 33, Omarekewe House, Off London Opi, Ekurede, Warri.
The two corporals were said to have been drafted from Squadron 36, Kebbi State, to provide security for a school owned by a popular Pentecostal church in Warri.
The deceased was said to have gone downstairs to collect his clothes from the clothe line at about 11pm of November 4 when one of the cops opened fire on him.
Bullets from the rifles, it was gathered, created a deep hole in the deceased right arm, with the hole measuring about five inches with the bone and cartilage at the point clearly destroyed.
Another bullet, sources said, pierced through the right side of the deceased’s abdomen, while a large hole was created on the shattered glass window from where the shots were fired at the 28-year-old truck assistant.
Co-tenants of the deceased, David Okon Gabriel, Joel Faruno and Olumide Fatoki, while speaking with journalists in Warri, said Nsikak’s blood spluttered around the backyard of the two-storey building.
Tribuneonline, however, gathered on Sunday evening that a former occupant of the building, who is a pastor in the reputable church in Warri, subleased the accommodation, a three-bedroom apartment, to the policemen.
However, it was gathered that the policemen implicated in the fatal shooting have a different version of what actually transpired.
The policemen, who are now being shielded from journalists, were said to have claimed that the deceased wanted to steal their uniforms hung on the clothe line.
Sources said the policemen claimed that they questioned Nsikak while removing the uniform from the line and he purportedly told them that he was stealing their uniforms to go for a robbery operation!
This allegation was, however, debunked by the trio of David Okon Gabriel, Joel Faruno and Olumide Fatoki who said it was far from the truth of why the trigger-happy cops killed the deceased.
It was gathered that members of the vigilance group in the area eventually apprehended the killer cops and handed them over to the police at B. Division in Warri.
A police source said the police suspects had been transferred to the police state command in Asaba even as several attempts to elicit the identity of the cops from the police at B-Division yielded no result.
Meanwhile, Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), DSP Celestina Kalu, could not give definite response on how far the case has gone and why the identity of the killer cops is being shielded, as she said she had just returned from a conference in the United States.
But Nsikak’s housemates, Okon and Faruno and neighbors are calling on the inspector general of police to investigate the matter and bring the killers of their friend to book in the spirit of justice.