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B N W: Biafra Nigeria World News |
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Protecting informants and rats
THE oft-repeated line that the police are no magicians is usually buttressed by a call on the public to co-operate with the police by furnishing the latter with useful leads that could help in crime-bursting operations. But the experience has not always been an altogether pleasant one for police informants. Although it is less the case these days, there had been instances when armed robbers reportedly tormented those who had squealed on them, thus giving rise to the strong suspicion that some cops in whom informants confided were in cahoots with the gangsters.
Shortly after his arrest, but before his trial in late 1986, Lawrence Anini narrated with glee how he dealt with an informant who lived on First East Circular Road in Benin City. Anini said he stormed the victim's house, armed with an automatic weapon and then "put a drainage through his head". It was significant nevertheless an informant's tip led to the successful raid on Anini's last hideout. Which is proof of the critical point that where members of the public are confident that the police will put information to proper use without harm to the confidential source, they will inundate the cops with useful tips on criminals, their whereabouts and modus operandi.
Yet, a whistle-blower faces grave risks. Such risks are higher where he is a turncoat, in which case his former confederates-in-crime would seek to teach him a bitter, often fatal, lesson for exposing their illegal activities. The other purpose is to also serve a dire notice to would-be rats, as to the ghastly fate that awaits them should they renege on their criminal obligations and switch allegiance to the state and law. Usually, the preferred mode for meting such harsh lessons is contract killing. Among the Mob in the United States, gangsters consider it a mark of honour and an opportunity for elevation in the criminal ranks, if they can hamburger a turncoat. The victim is either shot in the mouth, or he is killed anyhow and his tongue cut off, as punishment for violating the gangland rule of omerta (silence). Till his death in prison, Vito Genovese, head of the New York-based Genovese crime family, kept open the contract on the head of Joseph Valachi, the Mafia turncoat whose seminal and audacious revelations in 1963 gave the public, and indeed the FBI, the first real insight into the world of the Mafia.
In appreciation of the clear and present danger that stalks an informant/turncoat or critical witness, a number of jurisdictions have witness protection programmes or police protection programmes, as the case may be. Valachi survived Genovese and died peacefully under protection in jail. Until he was careless enough to blow his new cover, Sammy Gravano, a.k.a. Sammy the Bull or Sammy the Rat, enjoyed a witness protection programme in the United States. Gravano was the underboss to John Gotti, the so-called Teflon Don, and the former's testimony coupled with wire-tap evidence led to Gotti's conviction and sentence to life jail, without the opportunity of a parole, which he never got any way, since he died of cancer in June 2002.
What protection is available to an informant/turncoat in Nigeria? It is a pertinent inquiry in the light of the very disturbing interview published last Saturday by Weekend Vanguard. The interviewee was Chukwunemere Obidi Igwe, the erstwhile cultist who recently blew the whistle on the Okija shrines of Anambra State. Since 1973, Igwe had been with the cultists of Okija who combined deception with instalmental poisoning of their victims, to create an aura of mystery and fear in the name of a deity. To squeal on a clan with whom he had been associated for a generation was no mere act of courage. It was perhaps, also, an act of penance; and in the Nigerian context, a suicidal venture.
"The greatest problem l have now," Igwe told Weekend Vanguard, "is that l am scared. It is as if nobody cares about my protection in spite of the fact that l cried out to the police. I made appeals to them to provide adequate protection for me and members of my family." Last week, an attempt was made on his life. According to Igwe, "I knew the risk of what l did and never did l believe that those people would not come after me. That's why l went to plead for protection." Did he have to beg for police protection? If the police knew what they were doing, it should have been elementary that the moment Igwe blew the lid on the Okija Shrines, he was a marked man. Thus, his safety and that of his family ought to have been top priority.
For a highly valued turncoat like Igwe, how the police treat him is an indication of the level of interest that they have in getting to the root of and dealing with the Okija menace. For the 31 years that he was in the cult, Igwe could not possibly have exhausted just yet his insider knowledge of the criminal and fetish activities that went on in the shrines. Igwe is an encyclopaedia of Okija shrines. He is a rat no doubt; but a priceless witness in any criminal prosecution of the crooks and charlatans who ran the shrines. But by exposing him as an idle target for his pursuers, the police are shutting tight a tap of information from Igwe. The latter disclosed that much in the interview: "l have sworn not to reveal more information to the police because my life and the lives of members of my family are in great danger and the police is not doing anything to protect me."
Although he has reportedly been provided with two mobile policemen, since the attempt on his life, Igwe's post-disclosure trauma is the strongest case that could be made for the activation and sustenance of protection programmes for witnesses in high-profile criminal trials or for police informants. In fact, in a number of advanced countries, witness protection programmes are regarded as adjuncts of the administration of justice. People fear for their lives. They are even more mortified when they have to squeal on or testify against an accused with links to deadly gangs. Yet, without such information or testimonies, the law might never be able to rein in such criminals and give the deterrence effect. Some witnesses have been known to infuriate the prosecution by suddenly developing amnesia.
Protection programmes are not cheap. They are expensive; they often involve the beneficiary taking up a new identity and relocation, which cause disruptions to accustomed life style and a severance of ties with old friends. Whether our socio-cultural system makes this workable is open to debate. For a country like ours that invests only paltry funds on the police, a protection programme is like a request for luxury. But without that seeming luxury, even the meagre resources that the police now have will not be put to more efficient use. The police need more reliable information to fight crime more effectively. Members of the public would be wary of obliging the police with such information if doing so would expose them to certain danger and make orphans of their children.
Four years ago, Alan Decrabal, a father of three, testified against a well-known gangster at the Old Bailey in London. Before his testimony, Decrabal received warnings from gangsters to "shut up or we will shut you up". He defied them. The notorious gangster was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. Decrabal, too, fled into hiding; his marriage broke up. Later, three bullets and a warning were deposited in his letterbox. Not long afterwards, he was shot twice in the head in a car park in Kent.
Igwe also contemplated the gravity of his mission before he took the bold step of disclosure. "When l was trying to embark on this mission," Igwe told his interviewer, "my wife warned me that l am still very young...she was worried and said that our children are still very young and that if l should die while fighting this war, nobody will help her in training our children." Such worries are both paramount and pertinent in societies bereft of systemic safeguards. We cannot brand Igwe a heedless man; his has been a patriotic duty and the reward should be adequate protection for him, his family, and fellow informants and rats.
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