A Lance Corporal with the Ghana Prisons Service (GPS) has been promoted to the rank of Corporal for capturing a fugitive who escaped from the Ahinsan Camp Prison in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.
Cpl Edward Opoku, with service number 11557, who is a sound engineer with the Prison’s Master Piece Band, was rewarded for his bravery and professionalism in recapturing the escaped fugitive on December 3, last year, at Bomfa Akyiase in the Ashanti Region.
Cpl Opoku, who is based in Accra, has been with the Prison Service Band unit since his recruitment in December 2016.
At a brief ceremony to honour Cpl Opoku in Accra, in the presence of senior officials of the GPS, his colleagues, family and friends, he was presented with a citation after the administrative promotion.
Capture
Narrating how he captured the fugitive to the Daily Graphic, Cpl Opoku said he was going to visit a friend in Asiwa in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region but he had to stop at Bomfa Akyiase after the driver of the commercial vehicle he was travelling on decided to end the journey at that point.
Before he could continue his journey, he said he heard from some residents of the community that a fugitive who had escaped from prison had been arrested for stealing a mobile phone.
Cpl Opoku risked his life to rescue the escapee from the angry residents who were on the verge of lynching him.
“I sustained injuries while trying to protect the fugitive.
I feared for the life of the fugitive but the angry mob would not listen to me.
I had to show them my identification card at some point,” he said.
When he finally freed the escapee from the mob, Cpl Opoku said he took the captured fugitive to a police station in Pemenase, a community after Bomfa Akyiase, where the incident happened, since there was no police station in Bomfa Akyiase.
At the police station, the officers on duty failed to take the fugitive in, indicating that “they feared he could pass away in their custody because the prisoner was weak from the beatings,” said Cpl Opoku.
He then took the escapee prisoner to a medical facility where they both received medical attention after which the jailbreaker was lodged at the Kumasi Central Prison and later transferred to the Prison’s headquarters in Accra.
“These kinds of things do not happen often.
You just would not find any escaped prisoners roaming around,” he said.
Cpl Opoku expressed his appreciation to the leadership of the GPS, especially the Director-General, Isaac Kofi Egyir, for the honour.
Administrative promotion
Mr Egyir commended Cpl Opoku for exhibiting professionalism, bravery and courage to recapture the escapee.
He said the courage and competence he exhibited should motivate all personnel and officers of the service to be dedicated to their duties.
“This method of promotion is an exception to the general rules and specifications in these guidelines.
The recipient must have shown exceptional honesty, skill, bravery and efficiency”, he stated.
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