Family seeks N50m succour from Abia police brutality panel

The Chikezie Okameme family has urged the Abia State Judicial Panel on Police Brutality and Extra-Judicial Killings and Allied Matters to grant it N50 million as compensation for the alleged murder of their son and fuel dispenser, Chibuisi Chikezie Okameme, in Aba on April 5, 2020 by a Police Inspector, identified simply as Stanley Azu.

The request followed the testimony yesterday by one Mr. Kelechi Chikezie Okameme before the panel, chaired by a retired chief judge, Justice Sunday Imo, in Umuahia.

He told the committee that his younger brother was “shot while appealing to the team of policemen that were beating one Mr. Ikechi Charles (their client) to tamper justice with mercy, when Inspector Azu lowered his gun from his shoulder and fired at him at close range.”

According to him, the late victim was rushed to Abia State University Teaching Hospital, Aba where he was certified dead on arrival.

During cross-examination, however, police counsel, DSP F.C. Okafor deposed that the petitioner was not an eye-witness, insisting that he came to “hoodwink the panel on hearsay information”, adding that the deceased left his duty post to “obstruct the force from carrying out its lawful duties.”

The inquiring body later adjourned further hearing in the petition tagged, JUD/AB/80/2020, to March 24, 2021.