* Specialise in robbing bank customers
Okafor Ofiebor/Port Harcourt
Rivers State Police Command has arrested two robbery suspects;Ikenna Obiko, 30 years old, and Isichukwu Eneji, 24 years old on February 12, 2024 at the Olu Obasanjo area of Port Harcourt while riding a motorcycle.
According to press statement signed by SP Grace Iringe-Koko the Spokesperson for the Command,both suspects confessed to multiple crimes, stating that they specialise in loitering outside the premises of banks and gauging the amount of money customers withdrew. Whenever they notice any customer with a sizeable withdrawal, they tail them in their motorcycle and when they see an opportunity to pounce, they rob them. The duo also revealed that on some occasions, they just wait for the bank customers to park their vehicles and they proceed to open the vehicles with a master key that they had crafted and cart away with the money withdrawn and any other valuables.
“They also admitted to hotwiring and stealing parked motorcycles, as well as robbing unsuspecting bank customers of their money at ATMs around Olu Obasanjo and Aba Road”.
Also,the Command says that the two robbery suspects were recently involved in a robbery case involving a pick-up vehicle conveying Indomie noodles supplies where they forcefully took one hundred thousand Naira (N100,000) from the driver.
Police say their investigations confirmed that the two suspects had, within this year, stolen three motorcycles, one of which has been recovered and is now at the Borikiri Police Station in Port Harcourt. The two motorcycles were stolen from where their owners parked them along Choba Road and Eliozu.
Furthermore, Police say both suspects, now in police custody at the Borikiri Police Station, hail from Oguta in Imo State. Ikenna, a father of two children, claimed that he was lured into a life of crime by one of his community leaders (now deceased). Isichukwu, who is a father of three children, said his late uncle tutored him in the art of robbery.
Police investigations also show that the suspects both relocated to Port Harcourt last year following the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) crisis in Imo State and other parts of the South East.
Meanwhile, the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Olatunji Disu , has directed that the two suspects be charged immediately in an appropriate court of law.
CP enjoined Rivers residents to be vigilant while carrying out banking transactions and to avoid making stops whenever they have a substantial amount of money or other valuables in their cars. He also encouraged banks to report any suspicious activity around their premises to the Police.
He urged members of the public to continue to be law-abiding and support the police in the fight to rid Rivers State of crimes and criminality.