An ex-convict has been saved by policemen attached to the Aswani Divisional Police Station in Lagos State from being lynched by an angry mob.
The suspect, Usman Abudu and one other person simply identified as Aboy, now at large, had successfully duped a teenage girl, Ogechi Ude, of the sum of N7,800, before residents of the area attacked Abudu, last Wednesday.
Abudu had reportedly lied to the victim that he was in the area to deliver some goods to the buyer and that he could not get the buyer and was looking for somebody to help him sell the goods.
The 19-year-old victim said
“I was coming from the church when Abudu accosted me and told me that he brought some goods to his customers, who had just relocated from the area and that he needed somebody to help him sell it. I told him that I am not interested but he begged me and also the Okada man who was not far from us. As I was going, the Okada man called me back and said I should assist him (Abudu) because he said he used to keep the goods with one Reverend Sister in a Catholic church. So reluctantly I followed the two of them on the Okada,” the victim narrated.She stated further that,
“as we passed in front of the church I protested and he said the goods were kept in their quarters. Eventually we got to the place and he said we should wait a little that the Sister will soon come. Thereafter, he brought out two papers and dropped them inside the water and added a little chemical on it and asked me to be stirring the water for at least five minutes.
“After five minutes he brought the two papers out of the water and the papers turned to N200 that is N100 each. He then said he had two cartons of the paper which he put the amount at N400,000,000 and also said we would need about N30,000 to buy the chemical to wash them.
“The Okada man told me that that was an opportunity for us to be rich so they asked how much I could get and I told them I did not have any money, and they said what of my father that I should go and take some money from where he normally puts his money. I again told them that I did not know where my father keeps his money and later they asked of my mother. The Okada man said I should know where she keeps money then I said it was the N7,800 that she gave me to keep for her that was with me.
“They collected that and asked if my mother had gold jewelleries and told me to bring the jewelleries the following day, promising that I will go back with the jewelleries then they gave me their phone number.”Abudu who told Lagos Metro that his profession was to dupe people said it was better to be in the police custody or even in prison than for him to be in the hands of the angry mob. He added that he was earlier sentenced to prison, after operatives of the Lagos State Task Force on the Environment and other Related Offences arrested him and that he just returned from prison, last month.
Nigerian Tribune
