Detectives in Lagos have continued to unleash terror on kidnappers and have carried out several onslaughts against their deadly activities by making several arrests.
Notably, a major victory was recorded in Ajah, a suburb of Lagos, the sequel to the recent killing of nine notorious billionaire kidnappers in the city.
The victory took place after a gang of kidnappers abducted an oil magnate at Ado Road in Ajah, a few months back, and escaped through the waterways to the creeks in far-away Ondo State.
The oil magnet was in his dredging site when a six-man armed gang came to kidnap him into a flying boat and took him to an unknown destination through the waterway.
The heavily armed kidnappers shot sporadically into the air to scare everyone who might approach them.
Attempted escape
While in motion, the hostage managed to jump from the flying boat into the river in a desperate bid to escape but they also plunged into the river and went after him.
After catching him, they whisked him away to their stronghold in the creek at Ikorodu area of Lagos. The kidnappers, who transferred him from the flying boat into a wooden canoe to access the creek, only allowed him to make contact with his family on the third day when they demanded a ransom of N200 million.
N42m ransom
The family was able to raise N42 million which they converted to dollars as demanded by the kidnappers and it gave them 30, 000 U.S dollars and an additional cash of N100, 000 which they packaged and got ready for the trip to an unknown direction.
When the elder brother of the victim volunteered to deliver the ransom, they rather insisted that they must speak with the wife of their victim.
Shockingly, when the victim’s wife spoke with them, they insisted she must personally deliver the ransom to them.
Passionate pleas by the distraught lady that she was almost on the verge of delivering a new baby failed as they shouted back, asserting that if she failed to deliver the ransom, they would kill her husband.
At this stage, the love for her husband took over, and she assured that she would carry out their directives.
Unknown destination
Early the next day, she took off with a driver from their home in Ajah, and they directed her on the phone to move towards Ore, about 167 kilometres from Lagos. As their journey progressed, the kidnappers kept on monitoring and dishing out orders on where to stop and proceed. Eventually, when they got to Ore, the daredevils directed them to turn back and stop at Sagamu. They did as directed and, at Sagamu, a call came again directing them to move back to Ajah.
All this while, the kidnappers were warning that any attempt to engage the police would make them kill their victim, the lady and her driver, stating that they were closely and keenly monitoring their movement.
From Ajah, their call came again, ordering that they should move back to Sagamu. In total, the kilometres travelled were more the 334.
Lastly, the rigmarole, which kicked off around 6 am with the pregnant lady groaning in pain, ended around Odogbolu in Ogun State where they were directed to stop and trek through a bush path for about twenty minutes and drop the ransom.
This was around 6 pm. After that, they were shouted upon to race back to the road without looking back by three stern-looking and heavily armed young men.
Back to base
Luckily, when they got back to base in Ajah, their breadwinner was already in the house. He regained freedom eventually in another riverside area in Epe from where he found his way home.
He narrated that his abductors dispossessed him of a gold necklace valued at N25m, a gold hand chain valued N11.8m and two gold rings valued N3.4m. His abductors called their colleagues immediately after they got the money to release him.
Police action
Police sources said that after the kidnapping took place, relations to the victim reported the case but failed to carry detectives along in their efforts to pay the ransom.
Based on this, it was learned that the state Commissioner of Police, Adegoke Fayoade, directed his technical team, led by CSP Kehinde Oni, to swing into action and arrest perpetrators of the crime.
Police sources said they kept a tab on both the family and other criminal elements in the area, but narrowly missed their target while they were going to drop the ransom hence they resorted to scientific, technical and human intelligence gathering.
Arrest
At the end of their frantic operation, three of the kidnappers, namely Adelaja Ikuesan, 37, Tosin Oke, 40, and Oluwabunmi Yusuf, 39, were arrested in their hideout after they shared their loot.
Confession
The suspects narrated how the operation was carried out to Sunday Vanguard and lamented that, if set free, they would never take part in any criminal act again in life. Ikuesan said to be a professional speedboat driver, told our reporter: “I am from Pare town in Igbokoda LGA of Ondo State. “I own two flying boats code-named Trips on Marine, with each of them having a 40HP engine.
“I knew the other suspects when we were doing bunkering, i.e., stealing petroleum products from vandalized pipelines within the creeks. “Three weeks before the operation, we met in a hotel at Ajegunle, where we finalized plans to carry out the kidnapping.
“Tosin Oke whom we call Old Soldier, brought the engine of the flying boat. “On the day of the operation, two of our members were armed with AK47s, and before taking the hostage to the creeks, we disposed him of his gold chains and other valuables.
“When we got to the creeks, I left them with Old Soldier and came back to Apapa. We benefitted from both the sale of the gold chains and the ransom paid later”.
Badagry mansion
Police sources disclosed that Oke (a.k.a Old Soldier) had been involved in bunkering and kidnapping for a long and had erected a mansion in Badary area of Lagos. The suspect admitted that he benefitted from the ransom and used it to take care of his family problems. He denied building the mansion alone from the proceeds of his crime but stated that he erected it with some members of his family.
“I honestly regret getting myself involved in this”, Oke said.
“Even my family members were questioning my involvement because they were surprised knowing I don’t involve myself in any sort of bad act. “Before, I was an agent for police at Zone 2. What could have made me involve myself in this kind of thing?.
Confusion galore
“I don’t know. Maybe, it was juju Adelaja (his colleague) used in talking me into it, I don’t know, only God understands because it is not like I didn’t have money to feed or for other things before I followed them to do this.
“I just don’t understand how the situation happened.
I don’t understand.” On his part, Adelaja said: “After he (the third suspect) met me and Old Soldier, Old Soldier collected the hand chain we collected from the victim and sold it.
“After selling it, he sent N150,000 and later, N250,000 to me. A total of N400,000 was what he sent to me. It was Old Soldier who gave me money, he was the one who changed it. He transferred from POS. “In all, I got N2.3 million from the operation”.
The second suspect, Adelaja, also said that he used his share of the ransom to buy a new boat. The suspects said they were married. While Old Soldier said he has nine children from different women but is now married to only one, Adelaja said he has just one wife and a daughter.
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