A suspected highway armed robber has been gunned down by a civilian on the Atebubu-Kwame Danso Highway in the Atebubu-Amantin Municipality in the Bono East Region last Tuesday evening.

The deceased, 23, suspected to be a Fulani, was one of about six suspected armed robbers who attacked and robbed occupants of four vehicles that plied the road that evening.

The rest of his colleagues fled into the bush when they realised their colleague had been killed.

Vehicles whose registration numbers are yet to be identified were two cargo trucks and two SsangYong mini buses commuting from Kumasi in the Ashanti Region to Kajaji in the Bono Region when they were attacked and robbed.

Police response

The Bono Regional Police Public Relations Officer, Chief Inspector Augustine Kinsley Oppong, who is also in charge of the Bono East and Ahafo regions, told The Mirror that the civilian shot the suspected robber on the chest.

According to him, the police at Atebubu received a message that armed robbers were robbing commuters on the Atebubu-Kwame Danso Highway so a police patrol team was dispatched to the scene.

Chief Inspector Oppong said a victim informed the police that one of the armed robbers who was wearing a red T-Shirts over a grey-coloured trousers held a heavy stick and ordered him to lie on the ground.

He said when the police conducted a search at the crime scene, they saw a male adult believed to be Fulani aged about 23 years wearing a red T-Shirt over a grey-coloured trousers lying dead in a pool of blood in prone position.

Chief Inspector Oppong said an examination on the body revealed pellets wounds on the chest, adding that items such as a phone and GH¢72 cash was found on him.

He explained that a pair of sandals, a stick, a torch, two empty AA cartridges believed to have been used by the robber were retrieved.

According to Chief Inspector Oppong, the members of the patrol team also said they heard two gunshots around the area. At the scene, some of the victims said the robber died when a passenger on board one of the affected cargo trucks shot at him.

He said the body had since been sent to the St Mathias Hospital morgue at Yeji for preservation and autopsy.