Three people are detained by Ghana police for trying to sell a body for $1,153.
On Monday, police in the Volta region of Ghana announced that they had detained three individuals on suspicion of killing a man and trying to sell his body.
According to a police statement, the suspects—42-year-old Kalefe Korku, 21-year-old Afedo Kpotor, and 27-year-old Ametoke Sitsofe—killed 30-year-old Albert Anyinado and asked a traditional priest whether he might assist them in finding a buyer.
However, local media said that the police pretended to be interested in the trade after learning about it and bargained to purchase the body for 7,000 Ghanaian cedis ($1,153).
“The buyer agreed to meet the suspects at Agavedzi [village] near a lagoon to receive the dead body. But the suspects upon sighting the police abandoned the body and bolted. Police subsequently pursued and arrested all three suspects at their houses in Agavedzi, Agbozume and Adina,” Public Relations Officer of the Volta Regional Police Command DSP Effia Tenge said in the statement.
The traditional priest, known as a fetish priest, is not mentioned as an accomplice in the alleged crime, with the statement suggesting that he gave the tipoff to the police.
In West Africa, a fetish priest is a person who serves as a mediator between the spirits and the living.
It is believed that traditional priests in Ghana use bodies to perform money rituals for interested clients, and with the unemployment rate rising in the country, youths do not mind soiling their hands to make money.
Human trafficking crimes have been drastically reduced in recent times in Ghana.
