Date: 2017-04-04

Four years after a serving Commissioner of Police, Chinweike Asadu, was killed by robbers in Enugu, detectives, weekend, arrested a middle-aged man suspected to be the mastermind of the killing. Late Chinweike Asadu Mr. Asadu, who was in charge of Kwara State Command, was killed on March 2, 2013, while he was in the city en route to Port Harcourt for the annual police games. He was shot dead in front of his residence, while driving into the compound.

Immediately after his death, then Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar, gave orders that his killers be fished out dead or alive, prompting a massive manhunt that led to the arrest of six suspects. Escape Before they were charged and remanded in court, the suspects confessed that their leader, who pulled the trigger, escaped from the scene.

The search for the said leader led detectives to the commercial city of Onitsha, Anambra State, and when they raided his house, there was exchange of gunfire, during which he escaped. Police sources in Enugu said the suspected mastermind, identified simply as Somtochukwu, was arrested in a popular motor park with two others, last week, after they were involved in a bloody brawl with a trader.

Vanguard learned that during interrogation at the Central Police Station in Enugu, the suspected mastermind flashed an identity card bearing the name of the dead Commissioner of Police, claiming to be one of his sons.

Exposed His claim, according to sources, aroused the interest of the Divisional Police Officer, DPO, who is from the same area as the dead Commissioner. Further investigation revealed that he was telling lies.

One of the children of late Asadu, who was quickly invited by the police, revealed that the identity card was in her father's briefcase the day he was killed.

The DPO alerted the state Commissioner of Police, Dan Mallam, about the development, who in turn informed the Inspector-General, Idris Ibrahim.

The suspects, it was gathered, were immediately transferred to the State Criminal Investigations Department, CIID, where detectives are interrogating them. Contacted for comments over the development, Enugu State police spokesman, Ebere Amaraizu, said: "We have such a case, but I cannot give you the details now.

"The effort was part of the mandate given by the new Commissioner of Police, Dan Mallam, that all such unresolved cases must be properly investigated with a view to bringing the perpetrators to book."