By Chizoba Ogbeche
Abuja
Nigeria Police have smashed a kidnap for ransom gang allegedly responsible for several kidnappings and armed robberies in Abuja and other states, including the kidnapping of former General Manager, PAN, Alhaji Ozu Salami.
Parading the suspects before journalists, yesterday, at the Force Headquarters, Abuja, the Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO), CSP JImoh Moshood, said operatives of IGP Intelligence Response team (IRT) in a joint operation with Anti-Kidnap Squad of FCT Police Command arrested 11 suspected kidnappers.
‘Operatives of the IGP Intelligence Response team IRT jointly with Anti-Kidnap Squad of FCT Police Command after five days of painstaking and sustained surveillance arrested 11-member gang of vicious kidnappers on March 28, 2017.”
The spokesperson said Alhaji Salami was rescued from the kidnappers’ hideout, a two-bedroom apartment rented by the kidnappers in a remote side of Suleja Town, Niger state.
He said those arrested include suspected leader of the gang, Kelvin Emeka, 28; who was said to have been was earlier charged to Gwagwalada High Court in October 2016, alongside three others for kidnapping and armed robbery.
Also arrested was the suspected coordinator of the gang, Abdulrasheed Maigari, 35, who is graduate of Bayero University, Kano, and reportedly dismissed from the Department of State Services (DSS) and charged to court in November 2015, for allegedly robbing some dismissed Army personnel of N310 million in Abuja.
Moshood said the suspect, who was released by the court on November 28, 2016, provided a rented apartment in Suleja where they gang kept their victims.
Others included an arms dealer, Sunday Tyavnor, 33, who sold the AK47 Rifle and pistols used for the kidnappings; Zayor Alfred, 23; Avah Joseph, 25; Gabriel Friday, 33; Rajab Baba Ishiaka, 22; Ali Sani, 27; Nuhu Sule, 20; and Mohammed Abubakar, 21.
