31st December, 2017
Paul Iyoghojie
Operatives of the Zone 2 Command, Onikan, Lagos have arrested and arraigned a driver, Sunday Chidiebere Okeke, 29 and three others before a Lagos Magistrate Court for allegedly diverting a truck with 33,000 litres of petrol valued at N3.5m.
The truck, with the registration number Reg.No.FST 272 XP belongs to Arinze Anekwe. The suspects allegedly sold the content and the truck and escaped.
Other accused persons were Ejim Innocent, 41; Ofor Ifeanyichukwu Peter, 35 and Samuel Okafor, 37.
A. Police source said that the arrest of the accused persons was ordered by the Assistant Inspector General of Police, AIG in charge of Zone 2 Command, Lagos, Adamu Ibrahim following a petition by Arinze Anekwe.
The accused persons were charged before a Tinubu Magistrate Court, Lagos on a 5-count charge of felony to wit, stealing.
Police Counsel, Fransis Igbinosa informed the Court in charge No B/156/2017 that the accused persons committed the offence between January and February, 2016 at Tin Can Island Port and Ngwo area of Nsukka, Enugu State, Southeast Nigeria.
Igbinosa told the Court that trouble started for the accused persons when the complainant, Anekwe entrusted a truck filled with 33,000 litres of petrol valued at N3.5m to the driver, Okeke to deliver to a customer in Owerri, Imo State.
Igbinosa said that instead of the driver to deliver the petrol as directed, he connived with others to divert the truck and its contents to Enugu State and sold the petrol for N2m to Ofor Ifeanyichukwu, the owner of a filling Station at Ngwo in Nsukka.
He said that the truck driver also connived with Ejim Innocent and Samuel Okafor to sell off the truck valued at N10m at a give away price, shared the proceeds and escaped.
Igbinosa said that nemesis caught up with the accused persons when the complainant could not find his truck and the petrol for over two weeks the driver embarked on the journey to Imo State.
He said that when all efforts by the complainant to recover his truck and the contents from the accused proved futile, he reported the matter to the Zone 2 Police who swung into action and arrested the accused persons in Lagos and Enugu State through intelligence gathering and tracking.
Igbinosa said that the offences the accused persons committed were punishable under sections 411, 285, 287 and 328 of the criminal Laws of Lagos State, 2015.
The accused pleaded not guilty to the alleged crime and Chief Magistrate A.A Adefulire admitted them to bail in the sum of N2m each with two sureties each in like sum and adjourned the case till 6 March, 2018 for trial.