Posted by By Tony Edike on
ENUGU - The gruesome killing of a senior staff of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Mr. Titus Ezeronwu, by the police.....
ENUGU - The gruesome killing of a senior staff of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Mr. Titus Ezeronwu, by the police has sparked off a row between the police and some members of the university community.
The police in Nsukka shot dead Ezeronwu on July 31, 2006 claiming that he was an armed robber and displayed his corpse at the Nsukka Police Station on August 1, 2006 with a gun placed on his chest. Members of his family and some of his UNN colleagues later deposited his corpse at the Bishop Shanahan Hospital Mortuary at Nsukka.
Ezeronwu, who was the secretary to the Dean Faculty of Education in UNN met his untimely death that fateful night when he was shot by a police patrol team while trying to organize members of the vigilance group guarding his area.
A member of the vigilance group, who was also hit by the police bullets during the shooting, is now being treated at the Obayi Memorial Hospital at Nsukka under police supervision.
The police at Nsukka claimed that Ezeronwu was a member of an armed robbery gang that allegedly attacked residents of a house behind Obayi Memorial Hospital on July 31, 2006 but gave no further explanation as to the circumstances that let to the shooting.
The State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Mr. Mike Abattam, speaking on the development in Enugu at the weekend, said that the deceased UNN staff was a member of an armed robbery gang that attacked tenants of a building on Tectonic Street, Nsukka in the night of July 31, 2006.
He stated that policemen rushed to the scene of the robbery and in a shoot out with members of the gang one of the armed robbers was shot dead.
According to him 'The police responded and so there was an exchange of gun fire between the police and the armed robbers. One of the armed robbers was shot and fatally wounded while others escaped. A single-barrel locally made pistol containing one expended gun and two live cartridges were recovered from the armed robbers," Abattam said.
But the Ezeronwu family and his colleagues at the university disputed the police claim, insisting that the deceased who was over 50 was not an armed robber as he was only involved in organizing members of the neighbourhood watch in his area. They described Ezeronwu as the life-wire of the vigilance group.