Police in Niger State say they have arrested 3 suspects for conspiracy, abduction and impersonating the operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, who specialize in robbing and extorting students of the Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University, Lapai.
Also arrested alongside the trio were 2 of their informants for aiding and abetting the crime.
Spokesman of the Police, Superintendent Wasi’u Abiodun, in a statement, confirmed that on May 13 at about 8pm, information received indicated that about four suspected fake EFCC operatives were sighted at the students’ lodge, off campus via Lapai, abducted two students into a Toyota Corolla vehicle.
Police operatives attached to Lapai Division mobilised and trailed the vehicle to Suleja Road, by Kwakuti and arrested three suspects, except one who escaped from the scene.
It was gathered that all the suspects are residents of Abuja.
Abiodun added that during interrogation, they confessed that they were invited by their informants, as this is their means of livelihood.
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Nemesis was said to have caught up with them when they entered one of the students’ rooms with three electric tasers held as guns, collected five phones and abducted two persons.
It was also revealed that they requested ten million naira and later negotiated to five hundred thousand naira before they were arrested.
The trio confessed further that the I.D cards used were designed at a shop in Nyanya, Abuja, bearing the same identification number 1069.
The two informant collaborators gave the suspects information about the students, having known each other in Paiko, as one of them was identified as a dismissed soldier with criminal records and an ex-convict in the past two years.
All five suspects are under further investigation in the State Criminal Investigation Department, and they will be charged in court for prosecution immediately after the investigation.
(Editor: Paul Akhagbemhe)
