Four suspected armed robbers, now in police cell in Lagos, said their arrest was possible because they did not keep to their covenant with Ogun (the god of iron).
The suspects, Michael Shomuti, Bimbo Ibitoye, Idris Adebari and Saheed Abdulkareem, who were arrested by the State Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), were all commercial bus drivers living at Ikorodu area of Lagos State. According to them, the money they made from driving was not adequate for them to take care of their families so they decided to form a robbery gang in 2014.
However, before they embarked on robbery, they made a covenant by swearing in the name of Ogun (the god of iron) that after they had made enough money to start business individually, they would stop robbery. Within a few months, the suspects said they realised N1.6 million, which was shared evenly among them, with each of the suspects collecting N400,000. But instead of starting a business of their own, they forgot their oath and intensified their robbery operations.
For the first eight months, the suspects said they hired an Opel Savera bus with registration number AGL 634 DE from a mechanic at Imota in Ikorodu. Shomuti said they hired the bus for N10,000 each day they went for robbery from 5am- 9am.
According to him, they were constantly robbing people at Ikorodu, Ketu, Ojota, Oshodi, Oworonsoki, Bariga and Victoria Island, all in Lagos.
The suspect said usually they do not pick more than two or three people in the bus to avoid being overpowered. But, according to Shomuti, 34, they scaled up their operations when they bought an operational vehicle, a Mazda MPV, marked AKD 519CJ. He said: “We usually commence operations from 8pm to midnight with two cutlasses as our weapons to threaten our victims.
“We usually start from Ikorodu and pick the first victims at Berger Estate, dropped them at Iyana Oworo and from there to Oshodi. “Sometimes we picked five passengers at Oshodi and dropped them at Aswani on Oshodi-Apapa Expressway.” The father of one said he lived at Ijede near Ikorodu before he decided to join robbery last year.
He added: “I started robbery last year, I cannot remember how many times we have robbed but we robbed three times a week.” According to Shomuti, in one of the operations at Charley Boy bus stop, he was driving with Seyi and Kazeem who joined the gang later, in their vehicle.
They picked two passengers, a man and a lady who were going to work on the Lagos Island. After robbing the man, they pushed him out of the moving vehicle while Kazeem raped the lady.
This was after she was dispossessed of her handbag containing an ATM card, a handset, a wristwatch and an undisclosed amount of money. But suddenly there were gunshots from nowhere. Kazeem was hit and died instantly while Shomuti was rushed to a nearby hospital at Gbagada, where he spent 48 hours.
The hospital invited SARS led by a Superintendent of Police (SP), Abba Kyari, which took the suspect to the General Hospital, Gbagada. He suspect was later referred to Police Cottage Hospital at Ikeja Police College. The police used Shomuti as bait to arrest three other suspects with the exception of Seyi who literally disappeared since the day of the shooting.
http://newtelegraphonline.com/we-were-arrested-for-breaking-covenant-with-ogun-say-suspects/
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