Police Shoots Two Teenage Girls While Chasing ‘Yahoo Boys’ In Warri

Some unidentified policemen in Warri, Delta state have reportedly shoot two teenage girls in an attempt to arrest a fleecing vehicle in Edjeba community, Warri South Council Area of the state.

Eyewitness said that the incident occurred when the policemen were trying to stop a Toyota Camry car believed to have been driven by a suspected internet fraudster.

According to the eyewitness, the incident occurred Thursday afternoon around CAC Junction in the community, as the police fired shots at the vehicle in attempt to deplete its tyres but the shot hit two teenage girls on the street.

BIGPEN reports that the bullet reportedly touched one of the girls on the waist, while the other sustained injuries on her hands.

Sources said that the policemen drove in a gulf Jetta car with ‘Police’ inscription on the bonnet.

In one video footages of the incident which have since surfaced on the internet, residents of the area were seen catching glimpse around one of the teenage girls reportedly shot by the security officers.

The video indicated that she was later rushed to an undisclosed hospital in a tricycle, while voices in the background were saying “what is the Police doing?, “they were shooting at the tyres”.

In another clip, several persons, including the said policemen, gathered on a street. Both vehicles, the Police car and the Camry are spotted.

A similar incident which happened at the Praise Centre axis of Jakpa road, Uviwie council area in July, left a young boy dead as he was reportedly hit by a Police van, while they were chasing a suspected internet fraudster.

Recalls that a police patrol team attached to Safe Delta Command in the state, had on Wednesday arrested a music producer, Umukoro FearGod, alongside two artistes in Ughelli on the grounds that he was a “yahoo boy”.

Sources disclosed that the victims were, however, released Thursday morning after the Complaints Response Unit (CRU) of the Nigeria Police Force intervened on the matter, with a promise to carryout further investigations.

However, when contacted, the Delta State Police Command confirmed that only a girl sustained injury in the incident, adding that the team flagged down the vehicle on “reasonable suspicion”.

The State Police Spokesperson, DSP Onome Onovwakpoyeya, said “they were chasing a boy that they suspected and he refused to stop. They had to shoot at his tyres and it bounced back and hit a girl.

“The community people came out and as a result, the boy escaped with the vehicle. The girl was taken to a hospital by the police and is in stable condition. Nobody died”, she said.

Meanwhile, worried by the recent reckless chasing of people around the metropolis by the police in name of going after ‘yahoo boys’, residents of Warri, have taken to social media and other outlets to decry the recent actions of policemen against people, especially youths of the metropolis, calling for the intervention of the Delta State Government.

Speaking on the issue, a resident, who simply gave his name as Igho Tietie, has called on the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to urgently look into the spate of “brutality” unleashed by his men on harmless citizens in the oil city.

“I condemn in strong terms the excesses and brutality of the men of the Nigerian Police in Warri. The total disregard for due process and abuse of the fundamental human rights of the people in the city is unacceptable.

“I call on the IGP to urgently look into the activities of these men and take actions to correct them before more innocent lives are lost and the image of the NPF is further dented. These men need reorientation, retraining and possible relocation to save everyone from all these horrors,” Tietie stressed.