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 magnet 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
(allnews.ng)
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