Police Launch Manhunt In Chipata For Armed Robbers

POLICE in Chipata have launched a manhunt for two armed men who attacked a businessman from New Jim Nabvutika compound in the early hours of Friday and got away with US$9,600, K276,000, a Tecno cellphone valued at K1,600 and a Toyota Probox valued at K70,000.

And one person had both hands amputated while two others sustained serious injuries after the explosion of a grenade which they tried to break.

Eastern Province Police Commissioner Luckson Sakala said the total value of the stolen property was K488,500.

“As police, we have actually launched a manhunt for these two armed robbers. May I also appeal to members of the public to be on high alert as these two robbers are armed with a fire arm suspected to be a pistol, so any suspicious looking person or people that will be actually spending money lavishly because this is a lot of money, report them to the nearest police station,” Sakala said.

He said the victim Henry Banda was attacked around 02:00 hours on Friday.

And Sakala said police received a report of bomb explosion last Thursday around 15:30 hours in chief Mumbi’s area in Petauke district.

He said the report came from one of the concerned villagers from Levi village indicating that the explosion left three people with injuries.

Sakala said two males sustained deep cuts on both legs while one female aged 25 had both hands amputated.

He said all the victims were admitted to Minga mission hospital and were out of danger.

“This bomb is expected to be a grenade. Brief facts are that after picking this grenade they took it to one of the houses in the village and broke it with a hummer. They were trying to break it so that they could extract red mercury from the same grenade and in the process it exploded leaving these three with serious injuries,” Sakala said.

He appealed to members of the public not to temper with some of the suspicious looking objects. Sakala said people should report to the police when they come across suspicious looking objects.

He said recently two female juveniles died in Chadiza following a bomb explosion.