Operatives of the Special
Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), Ikeja, Lagos State, have arrested a man Oliver
Chukwuemeka Dike, aka Mopol, 35,for sponsoring gang of armed robbers to snatch
exotic cars.
Dike,
according to source was arrested at the Shagamu Road, in an operation led by
the Officer in Charge of SARS, a Superintendent of Police (SP), Mr. Abba Kyari.and
had a fake police identity card on him.
A police source said:
“Police started the search for Dike in April 2015 after two armed robbery
suspects; Akinropo Ogunsina and Jimoh Akeem mentioned his name during
interrogation that he was the receiver of the cars they used to snatch.
Ogunsina confessed that he and his gang members snatched two Honda Accord 230
model cars and Sienna Space Bus and sold to Dike. Unaware that Ogunsina had
been arrested, Dike repeatedly kept calling Ogunsina’s phone, asking if he had
another snatched car for sale.”
According to Ogunsina,
Dike bought two cars for N280, 0000 and was requesting for Toyota Highlander
Jeep, Toyota Corolla 2014 model and Honda Accord before his arrest.
The Lagos State Police
Command Public Relations Officer, Kenneth Nwosu confirmed the arrest of these
suspects. Nwosu said that it was in the process of receiving the Toyota
Highlander that Dike was arrested at Shagamu Road. Police recovered the sum of
N200, 000 from him which he wanted to use to pay for the stolen car.
Nwosu said: “When the
police came in contact with him, he identified himself as a police corporal. He
had a police identity card with him. The police team went along with him to his
house in Abuja for a search. They recovered a complete police uniform. The
police also recovered one of the cars, a Honda Accord he bought from Ogunsina
in his house.”
The Lagos State
Commissioner of Police, Mr. Kayode Aderanti has ordered detectives to ensure
that members of the gang are brought to book.
Dike, married with a
child, said that he was a motor spare parts dealer with a shop in Zuba motor
park, Abuja, before he took to crime.
He said: "In 2004, I
came to sell motor parts to a Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP). He is now
retired after being promoted to the rank of a Commissioner of Police. We became
friends. I told him that I’d like to work for him as his driver and assist in
doing some other domestic chores for him. He agreed. I left the motor parts
business for my younger brother and started following the DC.
"I started living in
his house. I used to drive him to work and other places. In 2005, he was sent
to War College and later became a Commissioner of Police. He retired in 2012.
After he retired, all his boys, including me, were transferred to the new CP
that took over from him. The new CP was later appointed as an Assistant
Inspector General of Police (AIG) before he was retired. Since then, I stopped
working with him.”
Dike confessed that the
police identity card found with him was that of the police orderly, named
Udeka. Udeka was an orderly to the first CP who retired.
Dike said: “Udeka asked me
to assist him collect his identity card from Yenagoa, capital of Bayelsa State,
where we last worked. He said that I should bring it to Abuja for him. But I’ve
not given it to him. As for the police uniform, I evacuated it from the dry
cleaner who does the dry cleaning of our boss's uniform in Yenagoa. I brought
it to Abuja and kept it in my house.”
He said that the police
arrested him because he came to buy a Highlander Jeep from Danjuma, otherwise
known as Ogunsina.
“I knew him as Danjuma not
Ogunsina. I knew him in 2011 through one of my brothers called Izuchukwu. He
informed me that he had a Sienna car for sale and I bought it for N200, 000,”
said Dike. “As at that time, I didn’t know that the car was stolen. It was
after I bought the second car, a Honda, that I knew that the vehicles were
snatched. I bought the Honda for N400, 000. Danjuma and his friends told me
that they wanted to sell it for N480, 000. I used to buy from them because they
sell at a very cheap price. It was because of the cheapness that I kept calling
them for more cars even though I knew they were armed robbers.” Explaining why he is called Mopol, Dike said: “People
call me Mopol because I drive police officers to office and back home. I also
do their laundries. They pay me N25, 000 as a casual driver, while my travel
allowance was N9000. As I was working for the police officers, I was also
buying and selling motor spare parts. It was Izuchukwu who called me that he
had a Sienna car to sell. I came and bought it. He then introduced me to
somebody I didn’t know. It was after I had bought the Sienna car that I knew
that the seller, Danjuma was an armed robber.”
The suspect said that his
wife didn’t know that he was into shady business, adding that the only thing
his wife knows was that he sells vehicle spare parts and drives police
officers.
He added: “It was the
devil that pushed me to commit this crime.”
