Fake journalist arrested

Story: Albert K. Salia
LUCK ran out for a man, Nii Armah Tagoe, who had posed as a journalist at a function in Accra demanding “solidarity” from the event organisers.
It was also established after his arrest that the Lutheran Church in Ghana had been looking for Nii Tagoe for allegedly stealing the palm computer, a digital camera and some diabetic drugs of one of their leaders on September 24, 2007.
He is currently in police custody pending further investigations.
The Nima Divisional Commander, Chief Superintendent A. Awuni told newsmen today that Tagoe, usually attended high profile events and introduced himself as a journalist.
He said what Tagoe did was to look through the list of media personnel invited to an event and when he detected that a media institution was not represented, he would write his name as a representative of such a media organisation.
According to him, Tagoe attended a programme organised by the Faculty of Law, University of Ghana, Legon and after the event went to see Professor Henrietta Mensah-Bonsu, the acting Dean, for “solidarity”.
He said Prof Mensah-Bonsu informed Tagoe she did not subscribe to the payment of solidarity to journalists.
Chief Supt Awuni said just before Tagoe could respond to a question as to which media institution he represented, other journalists present identified him as the person suspected to have stolen some personal items of a leading member of the Lutheran Church at the M-Plaza Hotel on September 24, this year.
He said he was subsequently arrested and when some senior officers of the Lutheran Church were invited to the police station, they identified Tagoe as the “journalist” who introduced himself as a reporter from a religious newspaper in Ghana.
According to Chief Supt Awuni, based on that, Tagoe was given access to one of the international visitors to interview him for the newspaper.
He said the visitor detected the loss of his palm computer, a digital camera and his diabetic drugs after Tagoe had left.
Chief Supt Awuni said when Tagoe was questioned on the theft of those items, he admitted stealing the items and said he had given them to a friend.