PHOTO: Slain German citizen Juergen Schedema
By Garmah Never Lomo,garmahlomo@gmail.com
Liberian police have reportedly arrested one of several suspected gunmen who attacked and killed an executive of a logging company in the southern Grand Bassa County last week.
The local police commander in Liberia’s central Bong County confirmed to www.newspublictrust.com on Monday, January 27, 2020 that suspect Emmanuel Kollie alisa “Pauleg” was arrested in Gbarnga, Bong County over the weekend and sent to Grand Bassa County, where the gruesome murder took place.
Gun men broke into the home of Juergen Schedema, alias Youkee and killed him during the early hours of January 22, 2020 in Big Joe Town. He was Manager of the International Consultant Company (ICC) prior to his death.
According to eyewitnesses, Saah P-Early, one of the security on duty disclosed that about 1:30 am, 13 armed robbers wearing masks, trooped into the logging company’s compound in Big Joe Town. They came from the back of the company and entered into the building and first tied the four security officers who were at the front gate and took them into a room along with some other staff of the company.
Police are currently interrogating the arrested, as a vigorous manhunt continues for the other suspected armed men said to be a dozen in number.
President George Manneh Weah has said his government will do all in its reach to arrest and prosecute ‘armed robbers’ suspected of killing a German expatriate last Wednesday in Buchanan, Grand Bassa County, about 88 miles from the Liberian capital, Monrovia.
A statement on the Executive Mansion website says President Weah “extends his deepest condolences to the government and people of the Federal Republic of Germany for the brutal murder”.
He said police was working with local authorities to bring the perpetrators of the crime to justice.
“Such savagery does not define Liberians; we are a hospitable people who will go all out to help visitors in our country,” the President is quoted as saying.
He noted that “Schedema’s death is a loss not just for the people of Germany, but all Liberians”.