By Johnbosco  Agbakwuru

CALABAR—The Cross River State Police Command at the weekend paraded two persons suspected to be armed robbery kingpins terrorizing residents of Ugep in Yakurr and Obubra Local Government Areas as well as parts of Ebonyi State.

Items recovered from the suspects included over one million rounds of ammunition, locally made pistols, assorted riffles including AK47, G3, a 14 seat ‘Joy Long’ bus with the inscription Government of Anambra State  and another vehicle belonging to the Cross River state government.

The suspects who gave their names as Chukwuka Umoke, from Izzi Local Government Area of Ebonyi State and Leonard Azubuike from Okporo in Orlu Local Government Area of Imo State were said to be among the notorious gang that operated in Ugep penultimate week. They allegedly killed over seven persons in the operation.

The robbery incident led to the vandalisation of the Police Station by locals who accused the Police of failure to intervene when they ( indigenes)  foiled the gang’s attempt to rob First Bank of Nigeria Plc.

...the suspects

Speaking after parading the suspects in Calabar, the Cross River State Police Public Relations Officer, Mr. Hogan Bassey, an Assistant Superintendent of Police said  two members of the unspecified robbery gang were nabbed in the Afikpo area of Ebonyi State through the combined security operations of both states.

He confirmed that some members of the robbery gang were killed during exchange of fire, while an army sergeant attached to a military check-point around Amasiri/Afikpo junction in Ebonyi State also lost his life during the combat.

Also speaking, the Head of Robbery Unit in the state’s Criminal Investigation Department, Mr. Fidelis Alor, said the process of arrest was long, adding that most of the robbers lost their lives during the exchange of bullets with policemen.

Alor said, “One of their gang members was shot at Ugep and they carried him like that during the process of their escape. They met various check points at Ebonyi State in three or four locations, where one of them testified he personally shot one army sergeant.  Another policeman was also shot in Ebonyi State.

“It was from Ebonyi State that they disorganised  and everybody went his way. These were the same set of robbers that terrorised Ugep in Yakurr Local Government of Cross River State. They came to Ugep on a Sunday, stayed in a hotel, surveyed the town on Monday and started the operation on Tuesday. We have not been able to bring together the number of casualties in that Ugep incident, ” he said.

One of the suspects, Azubuike confirmed that he was responsible for the death of the army sergeant. “I am the one that killed the soldier at check point close to Amasiri/Afikpo in Ebonyi State.

I did not kill any policeman or civilian. We were to go and rob a bank at Ugep but did not succeed because the resistance put up by the Police and some of the indigenes were beyond us, so, we found a way to escape,” he said.

Continuing, he said: “The man that introduced me to this business is Benjamin ‘China’. He called me to come direct the driver to where he was because the driver was not conversant with the road. I do not know this particular arrangement; I am a victim in this particular one. I was only leading them when I discovered that they were shooting the military men, I was in a Toyota Sienna bus with another person leading the bus that the robbers were.”

But Alor, a DSP, said, “They have confessed to us that they have participated in four different robbery incidents in Ondo, Lagos, Cross River and Imo states. Umoke said in one of the robberies, they gave him N1.6m, in another he got $1, 000, while in the third he sustained bullet wounds and that one native doctor in Port Harcourt treated him.  “They have said that their gang leader was one Henry and that their source of arms and ammunition is Niger Republic.”