C/R: ‘Pragya’ rider burns wife, five children and grandchild to death at Breman-Dunkwa

A 42-year-old commercial auto rickshaw rider popularly known as “Batman” has wiped out his entire household in a midnight inferno that has left this quiet farming community reeling in grief and disbelief. Yaw Afriyie aka “Batman”, after a heated domestic row, allegedly tricked his wife into the children’s bedroom, doused all seven with petrol, padlocked the door from outside and ignited the blaze that claimed every life inside before dawn on October 31.

Neighbours woke to desperate screams and the roar of flames leaping from the single-storey concrete-block house on the outskirts of Breman Dunkwa. By the time the Ghana National Fire Service tender from Dunkwa-on-Offin arrived, the room was an oven of blackened timber and melted zinc. Firefighters recovered seven charred bodies: the wife (name withheld pending formal notification), five biological children aged between 18 months and 12 years, and one seven-month-old grandchild who had been spending the night.

Fifty metres away, under a mango tree in the same compound, Afriyie’s body swung lifeless from a nylon rope. A half-empty 4-litre jerrycan of petrol, a box of matches and the heavy padlock used to seal the bedroom door were bagged as exhibits by the first police responders.

Residents who lined the dusty road outside the cordoned scene on Sunday described Afriyie as the cheerful pragyia rider who ferried schoolchildren, market women and sacks of cocoa to neighbouring villages. “Every morning he passed here with two kids strapped behind him, waving and shouting ‘Batman deɛ ɛyɛ!’” said Madam Esi Mensah, a provisions seller. “Nobody ever saw anger in his eyes.”

Yet behind the nickname lay mounting money worries. Erratic fuel prices and slow passenger flows had slashed daily earnings to barely GH¢40 on bad days, relatives later told investigators. Neighbours recalled hearing raised voices from the couple’s room two nights earlier, but domestic quarrels are rarely reported in Breman Dunkwa.

According to statements gathered by the Central Regional Crime Scene Team:

23:40: Afriyie returns from a late-night passenger drop-off.
23:55: Argument erupts over household expenses.
00:05 (Nov 1): Afriyie tells wife, “Go and check the children, they are crying.”
00:07: Wife enters bedroom; Afriyie follows with jerrycan hidden behind his back.
00:08: Petrol splashed; door slammed and padlocked.
00:09: Flames visible through louvres; screams last less than two minutes.
00:25: Afriyie knots rope to mango branch, jumps from plastic chair.

No suicide note has been found. Call logs extracted from Afriyie’s Tecno Spark show 14 missed calls from his wife between 22:30 and 23:30, followed by a single outgoing call to an unsaved number at 23:52 that lasted 11 seconds.

Autopsies began Sunday afternoon at Dunkwa Government Hospital mortuary. Preliminary findings confirm all seven victims died of third-degree burns and carbon-monoxide poisoning. Toxicological screens are testing for alcohol or narcotics in Afriyie’s blood. Ballistics ruled out any firearm; the only accelerant was commercial petrol purchased two days earlier from a roadside kiosk 800 m away.

Nightly candlelight vigils now fill the community centre courtyard. Imams and pastors lead joint prayers while volunteers distribute maize porridge to shell-shocked relatives. The Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa District Assembly has released GH¢15,000 toward mass burial costs and promised psycho-social counsellors from the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection by Tuesday morning.