Crime Cases Soar In WR

The crime wave in the Western Region has gone up steadily due to the oil find and the influx of foreign companies in the region. The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in the region therefore needs the requisite means to curtail the use of sophisticated means to committing crime. Supt Reuben Asiwoko, Western Regional Crime Officer, made the revelation at the opening of a two-week training programme for Aides to CID in the Western Region at Sekondi yesterday. The training is aimed at equipping the CIDs with basic investigative skills to impact positively on their performance on the field. The areas to be covered in the two-week programme would include basic investigative skills, interrogation and interviews, identification methods, selected topics on criminal law and arrest, detention and searches. The rest of the topics include report writing and communication skills, preparation of dockets, CID forms, surveillance, human rights and crime scene management. He lamented about the need to increasing the number of CIDs in the region in order to surmount the challenges in the area. The Director General of CID of the Ghana Police Service (GPS), Prosper Kwame Agblor, warned the few unscrupulous police men whose attitudes tend to dent the image of the service to turn over a new leaf. He, had therefore, urged all CIDs to refrain from meddling in civil cases to demonstrate respect for human rights and to avoid corrupt practices in the discharge of their duties. He also reminded all police detectives that arrests, searches and detentions should be carried out within the confines of the law. Mr Agblor stressed that the core function of the CIDs was crime detection and that the personnel could effectively perform the function through diligent investigation of cases. He called on the public to partner the police in the fight against crime, stressing that fighting crime was a shared responsibility.