14th April, 2023
By Suleiman Shehu
A gang of robbers made up of a man, his sister and her boyfriend which specialised in snatching motorcycles from commercial motorcyclists have been busted by the operatives of the Oyo State Police Command.
The suspects were paraded in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital on Friday by the Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of the Command, SP Adewale Osifeso.
Osifeso said that the suspects attacked one Adebiyi at Odo-Oba area of Ibadan on March 12 while he was going about his commercial motorcycle business.
He said that the suspects pretended to be passengers and lured Adebiyi to a desolate area where they used cutlass to inflict severe bodily injuries on him before dispossessing him of his TVS motorcycle and fleeing from the scene.
The PPRO said that the victim, who was left in the pool of his own blood, was later rescued and rushed to the hospital.
He stated further that the victim later died due to the severity of the injuries inflicted on him.
“The incident was reported at Idi-Aro division, Ibadan, and efforts are being made to fish out the hoodlums.
“On March 14 at about 6.00 a.m., the same set of armed robbers attacked another motorcyclist, one Taoheed Wahab, at another desolate location and equally dispossessed him of his Bajaj motorcycle at gun point.
“The incident was equally reported at the same police division and in the course of preliminary investigations, three of the armed robbers were arrested in connection with the crime,” he said.
Osifeso said that upon interrogation at the command’s monitoring unit, the suspects confessed to have perpetrated the two incidents and equally confessed to have masterminded two other similar armed robbery attacked within the same area on March 4.
He further said that investigations had also led to the arrest of three criminal receivers of the stolen motorcycles.
In an interview, one of the suspects claimed to have personally snatched three motorcycles from January till date and he said he could not count the number of motorcycles that his gang had snatched.
The suspect said that he used to be a fashion designer and that his sister and her boy friend usually accompanied him whenever he was going for motorcycle snatching.
Also, 26 suspects were also paraded by the command for various offences, including armed robbery, kidnapping and cattle rustling, among others.
Four other armed robbery suspects were paraded for allegedly trailing and attacking a businesswoman while returning from her shop at Orita-Challenge area of Ibadan on April 1 and dispossessing her of N6 million and phones.
Osifeso listed the items recovered from other suspects to include: one Toyota Camry car, five motorcycles, two cell phones, two locally-made guns, eight cows and 15 live cartridges.
(NAN)