Man arrested for defilement found hanging in police cell

A 38-year-old man arrested in connection with a defilement case has died in police custody in what authorities suspect to be a suicide, police have confirmed.

The deceased, identified as Emmanuel Cudjoe, a carpenter, was arrested in the early hours of Sunday, May 10, at Agyei Krom in the Komenda Edina Eguafo Abirem Municipality of the Central Region.

He had been taken into custody over allegations of defiling his 11-year-old stepdaughter.

Police said the suspect was later found hanging in his cell at about 11:00 a.m. the same day.

According to preliminary information, the station officer at the Agyei Krom Police Station was alerted by the counter non-commissioned officer after the suspect was discovered unresponsive.

Investigators say Cudjoe is believed to have used a strip of cloth, reportedly removed from the edge of a blanket, to hang himself.

Personnel from the Elmina District Police Command and the Regional Crime Management Team subsequently visited the scene.

“The suspect was found hanging against the wall with a ligature firmly fastened around his neck, with no visible marks of assault on the body,” a source familiar with the investigation said.

Crime scene officers processed the area before the body was conveyed to the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Cudjoe, a native of Ayensudo, a suburb of Elmina, remains at the hospital morgue pending further investigations.

Police have not yet indicated whether an internal inquiry will be conducted into the circumstances surrounding the death.