Police dismiss 7 officers over extortion in bank
The Evangelist
December 22, 2022
The Imo State Police Command has dismissed and charged to Court seven ex-policemen who were arrested on 08/11/2022 at about 1300hrs, in a bank at Umuahia, Abia State, in the course of performing alleged illegal duty outside their jurisdiction and conspiracy to extort money from an innocent victim.
The ex-policemen were defaulted, tried and found guilty of the charges levelled against them and were summarily dismissed and charged to Magistrate Court, Owerri with Charge Sheet Number: No. OW/746C/2022.
In a statement on Thursday, Michael Abattam Police Public Relations officer said , “Sequel to the inundation of the office of the Commissioner of Police with series of reports/complaints by members of the public on Police brutality, harassments, extortion, illegal checking of phones and flagrant disobedience to the Inspector-General of Police directives on extortion and incivility to members of the public, the Imo State Police
“It will be recalled, that the ex-policemen were arrested on 08/11/2022 at about 1300hrs, in a bank at Umuahia, Abia State, in the course of performing illegal duty outside their jurisdiction and conspiracy to extort money from an innocent victim. They were defaulted, tried and found guilty of the charges levelled against them, thus were summarily dismissed and charged to Magistrate Court, Owerri with Charge Sheet Number: No. OW/746C/2022.
“Consequently, the Commissioner of Police has directed all Area Commanders, Heads of Departments (HODs), Divisional Police Officers (DPO) and Tactical Teams Commanders of the various units in the Command to ensure their subordinates are warned against indulging in these sharp practices as any Police Officer found complicit will be made to face disciplinary actions.”
He directed the officers in charge of the Inspector-General of Police X-Squad Unit and the Commissioner of Police Monitoring Unit to commence high-level monitoring of the police officers within and outside the metropolis to forestall any unprofessional conduct by police officers.
He further warned officers and men to be professional and uphold international standard best practices in the discharge of their duty.
He appealed to members of the public to ensure proper conduct at all times in their encounters with police officers to avoid infractions which may be subject to prosecution and advised them to use the Command’s emergency control room numbers, in times of distress.
