Police report murders in Lae

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POLICE in Lae reported three murders in the city area between 5-Mile and 6-Mile last week.
Lae Met Supt Chris Kunyanban said the latest one was the death of a security guard last Saturday.
He said burglars tried to enter a premises (Moale Service Station at 5-Mile) and had a confrontation with the guard.
“While the guard was confronting the thieves, he was shot at point-blank range in the abdomen and was rushed to the Angau Hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival,” he said.
Responding to the situation, members of the Guard Dog Security allegedly gathered and destroyed properties which police claimed belonged to innocent people living at those areas.
But police is yet to assess the damage. Met Supt Kunyanban said police had calmed the situation and community leaders showed support to work with police to identify suspects in the murder.
In the second killing, a man from Kaintiba in Gulf was kidnapped at a haus karai (mourning house) and was found dead the next day.
Police is treating this case as a kidnapping and murder and are investigating.
This incident also happened at 5-Mile on the same night as the killing of the Guard Dog security guard.
According to the deceased man’s daughter, Lina Peter, her father was at the haus krai and was suspected by youths as a sorcerer.
“The youths there bashed up my father and stabbed him with a knife on his forehead,” she said.
Peter said when they located her father’s body last Sunday, along the banks of Markham River at the back of 6-Mile, it has knife wounds all over the body and was packed in a stockfeed bag.
Met Supt Kunyanban said the situation was tense but police were monitoring it.
In the third murder case in the same area, a person was killed over a piece of land further in towards the swamp area at the back of 5-Mile and 6-Mile.