By Sarah Ojobo.
Operatives of the Force Intelligence Response Team (IRT), in collaboration with officers of the Rivers State Police Command, have nabbed a kidnap syndicate that specializes in luring unsuspecting victims through social media platforms to their den, in Choba and Etche areas of Rivers State.
It was reported that the arrest was based on credible intelligence on their nefarious activities in River State which resulted in the kidnap and gang-raped of a 27-year-old lady identified as Happiness, on August 28, 2021. The suspects are; Izunna Fidelis, 21, Humble Unity Okeregwu, 24, Izuchukwu Nwaobiri, 22 and Chibeze Nwike, 23. They admitted during interrogation to have kidnapped, tortured, raped, robbed and collected ransoms from at least ten 10 females since January 2021, with their highest ransom collected pegged around Five (5) Million. The suspects further confessed that to get the attention of their victims, they take to their respective Facebook pages posing as foreigners working in multinational oil companies in Rivers State and professing love as well as proposing marriage to their Facebook girlfriends, all in a bid to cajole them.
One of the suspects, Nwaobiri, said that the first thing they do is to check Facebook profiles for beautiful girls. Then, add them to their friend lists. And each of them works on different persons. He added that he would start up a conversation with my supposed girl, exchange pleasantries and tell her that he works with an oil company and also ask if she was married or single. Thereafter, they would progress to Whatsapp chats and then telephone calls and when friendship has been established, they invite them over to the company’s base which is a bush where they would be blindfolded and calls put across to their families for ransom.
Notwithstanding, this should be an eye-opener and great lesson to ladies on social media to desist from falling in love with strangers that they have no idea of who they truly are in order not to fall prey to criminal elements.