Cop in cocaine case passes away

Page 3: Daily Graphic, April 17, 2009.
Story: Albert K. Salia
ONE of the three policemen who was sentenced to 25 years’ imprisonment for facilitating the escape of a cocaine fugitive, died yesterday morning at the Nsawam Government Hospital.
Lance Corporal Peter Bondurin was found guilty of receiving an unspecified amount in US dollars from Sheriff Asem Dakeh, alias The Limping Man, and allowing him to flee with 2,280 kilogrammes of cocaine.
He was rushed to the hospital on Wednesday at about 8:30 am but was treated and discharged.
However, according to the Chief Public Relations Officer of the Ghana Prisons Service, DSP Gloria Fati, Bondurin was rushed back to the hospital between 3:30pm and 4pm the same day but passed away yesterday morning.
Bondurin and his two other colleagues, Sergeant David Nyarko and Detective Corporal Dwamena Yabson, were on December 21, 2007, sentenced to a total of 75 years, imprisonment with hard labour by the Accra Fast Track High Court for facilitating the escape of Dakeh.
They were convicted on two counts of extortion and corruption by a public officer after the court held that the prosecution had led evidence beyond reasonable doubt to prove their guilt.
A third accused person, Detective Sergeant Samuel Yaw Amoah, who was said to have collected the money from Sheriff and in turn shared it with the convicts and some fishermen and is currently on the run, was described by the presiding judge “as a disgrace to the police service”.
The presiding judge, Mr Justice Annin Yeboah, who was then a Court of Appeal judge, with additional responsibility as a High Court judge, held that, “Amoah escaped as a result of the negligence of the police. The image of the police has been tarnished and it is unfortunate the police allowed him to escape.”