Update On Lagos Robbery: Members Of The Gang Arrested

Three armed robbery suspects -
Uche Okeagbu, Emmanuel
Ezeani and Chinonso Nwuangwu
- have been arrested by the
Special Anti-Robbery Squad,
Lagos Command, in connection
with the September 9, 2012
robberies in the state, which left
three policemen and a civilian
dead.
The suspects were arrested at
their Ajangbadi hideout on
September 23 following a tip-off.
The suspects were said to be
members of a much larger
group, which had about three
weeks ago, carried out
simultaneous robberies in
Gbagada, Agege, Anthony,
Ojodu, Itire, Ikeja and Ilasamaja
areas of the state.
It was learnt that after 23-year-
old Okeagbu was arrested, his
confession led to the recovery of
a large cache of ammunition,
one rocket propel grenade
launcher, 225 AK 47 magazines
fully-loaded, over 10,000 rounds
of AK 47 live ammunition, two
general purpose machine guns,
260 rounds of GPMG live
ammunition, five dynamite with
detonator and nine AK 47 rifles.
A self employed oil dealer before
his foray into armed robbery,
Okeagbu said: “I was an oil
dealer in Port Harcourt before a
friend introduced me to this
gang. I have been with them for
a while and during the time, I
went with them for four
operations in Ibadan where I got
N500,000 as my share. Another
was in Uyo where I got N800,
000. I also got N800, 000 for the
First Bank robbery at Share,
Kwara State and N100,000 for
the Lagos robbery. All these took
place this year.
“In all these operations, the
targets were banks which we
robbed successfully. I never went
with the group into the banks. I
always stayed back with the
driver in the car because I was
scared but I didn’t go with the
gang when they raided Lagos
three weeks ago.”
A SARS team led by Mr. Abba
Kyari, found the gang’s armoury
in two Volkswagen buses with
registration numbers LSD 467 AR
and AGL 506 XB, parked at
Okeagbu’s residence at
Ajangbadi.
Also, Nwuangwu said he took
part in four robbery operations
at Diamond Bank, Akure, in
Ondo State, UBA, Osogbo in
Osun State, GTB Okene, in Kogi
State and Skyebank, Auchi, in
Edo State.
The 23year-old said, “I was
merely the driver of the vehicles.
I just drove them to whereever
they had an operation...but I
have stopped going with them
for operations for a while now.”
The Commissioner of Police, Mr.
Umar Manko, said the suspects
were members of the gang that
terrorised Lagos about three
weeks ago.
“I would also like to say that
since the September 9 robbery
operations that the command
has not recorded any other
robbery incident. There have
been robbery attempts in several
parts of the state but these have
been quelled by the police.
“I encourage the public to
continue to come forward with
useful information of any
suspicious activity around them
because that was how we got
information on these suspects,”
the police boss said.