Police Arrest 44 Suspects For Thuggery, Restiveness In Niger

Niger State Police Command has arrested 44 suspects for criminal conspiracy, robbery, thuggery, and causing restiveness within the metropolis of Minna the state capital.

The arrests followed the recent report of miscreants’ clashes, thuggery, and pockets of tricycle robberies in parts of the metropolis.

LEADERSHIP findings revealed that areas within the state capital such as Stadium Junction, Limawa, Angwan-Daji, Bosso road, Flamingo junction, Morris junction, and Barkin-Sale have witnessed restiveness accompanied by snatching of motorcycles, mobile handsets, and tricycles in recent weeks.

They also caused public unrest, inflicting serious injuries on victims and dispossessing unsuspecting members of the public of their valuables.

Consequently, the police command public relations officer Wasiu Abiodun said in a bid to curtail the recent trend and menace, the command tactical teams comprising of operations department, CTU, Anti-kidnapping unit, tactical support team, Area Command team, and various patrol units in the metro and vigilante members led by the deputy commissioner of police, operations, DCP Ali Hayatu Kaigama, conducted house to house raid sting operation within the areas.

He said during the raid, 44 members of the various notorious gangs causing the menace were arrested with different types of dangerous weapons.

Abiodun said others were arrested at different locations while on patrol and even at the scene of committing the crime by the ‘A’ Division patrol team.

The police spokesperson said some of the dangerous weapons recovered from the suspects included eleven cutlasses, four scissors, five knives, four swords, one garotte, five sticks, eight handset phones, three shisha pipes/pots, a big saw, scale, an iron bar, a bottle containing illicit drugs, screwdriver, bunch of keys, and ATM cards.

“All the suspects have been transferred to SCID for discreet investigation and they will be arraigned in court for prosecution with capital offence charges,” he declared.

Abiodun said the commissioner of police, Ogundele Ayodeji, has expressed satisfaction with the operation and directed that the operation will be a continuous exercise towards ensuring that Minna metropolis is rid of unguarded elements disrupting the peace of the state capital.