File photo

By Henry Ojelu

More revelations on the activities of the disbanded police Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS’s operatives emerged on Saturday at the Lagos EndSARS panel, as a 35-year-old hairdresser, Mrs Hannah Olugbodi, narrated how her left leg was shattered by a stray bullet fired by a SARS officer.

Olugbodi told the panel led by Justice Doris Okuwobi (rtd) that the incident took place in June 2018 at the Ijeshatedo area of Lagos, when SARS operatives were attempting to arrest a young man with tattoos.

Olugbodi said she was at Ijesha market trying to buy pepper to prepare food for her children to take to school the following day when she was hit by a stray bullet.

According to the petitioner, the SARS operatives were at one Ogun City Hotel, to demand money to fuel their vehicle when they saw the young man with tattoos among a group of persons watching a football match at the hotel.

She said the owner of the hotel, one Abu, who usually gave the SARS operatives money, was not around to attend to them.

The SARS operatives labelled the young man with tattoos a Yahoo Yahoo boy (cyber fraudster) and their attempt to take him away was resisted by the other boys, making the SARS operatives to resort to firing gunshots.

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The petitioner said she was eventually taken to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, where they said there was no bed space and she was given four bags of intravenous fluid right in the bus.

“The doctor said they needed to do four surgeries. The bullet affected my bone. The doctor said the second surgery would involve cutting off my bone,” she said.

Olugbodi said she spent six months at LUTH and the doctor told her she needed to return two years later for follow-up surgery.

“I can’t walk properly; I feel pain every five minutes. When I sat there (in the hall), I felt the AC (air conditioner) inside my bone; I had to go out for a while.

“I can’t walk properly. I stagger. In the midnight, I can’t sleep. I can’t do my work. For two years, I have been at home, doing nothing.

“The panel should compensate me and my two kids. It is only my husband that is doing everything,” Olugbodi said.

The petitioner’s husband, Oluwaseun Olugbodi, who also testified before the panel, corroborated his wife’s story, adding that the Divisional Police Officer in the area told him that the stray bullet was fired by SARS operatives from Gbagada.

The panel adjourned the case till December 8 for further hearing.

Vanguard News Nigeria