Crime & Punishment of Sunday, 9 April 2006

Source: Mirror

Murder In Church

A gun-wielding husband last Thursday stormed a normal church service at Manhyia, near Kwapong in the Asunafo South District, and gunned down the officiating pastor.

As the congregation fled in terror, the man, said to be a farmer, went in hot pursuit and gunned down his own wife, whom he had suspected of flirting with the pastor, before shooting himself to death.

Policemen from the Kukuom District Police Command later collected the three dead bodies and deposited them at the morgue of the Goaso Government Hospital for post-mortem examination.

Giving details of the bloody incident to the press, the Brong Ahafo Regional Police Commander, Mr Kwaku Ayesu Opare-Addo, said the farmer, Kwadwo Gyasi, had long suspected that the pastor, Reverend Attah of the Calvary Prayer Ministry, was flirting with his wife, who was a member of the church.

He said around 8:30 p.m. last Thursday when Pastor Attah was preaching to the congregation in a classroom, Gyasi suddenly emerged with a loaded single-barrelled gun and fired at the pastor, resulting in his instant death.

Mr Opare-Addo said when the pastor fell and the congregation, including Gyasi?s wife, scattered in panic, the enraged man gave them a hot chase, caught up with them, held his wife, by name Madam Tawiah, pushed her into a nearby bush and shot her at close range.

The Regional Police Commander said Gyasi then turned the gun on himself and blew his head off. He said a member of the Manhyia Unit Committee, Mr Isaac Mensah, later reported the incident to the Kwapong Police, who in turn informed the Kukuom District Police Command, which despatched a team to the scene to conduct investigations into the matter.

Mr Opare-Addo stated that when the policemen visited the scene, they found the two bodies and later that of the suspected murderer lying near a locally-made single-barrelled gun.

He said all three bodies had been deposited at the morgue of the Goaso Government Hospital awaiting post-mortem examination.

According to the Regional Commander, the couple had no issue. He said no arrest had been made, explaining that the police were finding it very difficult to conduct investigations into the matter because the suspect and the two principal witnesses were all dead.