The police in Lagos have dragged a man, Ikechukwu Odoh, before an Apapa Magistrate’s Court for stealing his own children.
Ikechukwu Odoh and his lover, identified as Eme Odoh, had been cohabiting and had two children, but they were not legally married.
While Eme was attending a Pentecostal church, her lover, Ikechukwu and their two children were members of a Catholic church.
The police at Festac said on the day the incident occurred, that the woman had gone to her church, while the man, who also pretended to be leaving for his own church with the two children, later came back to the house to remove his belongings and those of the children, including pictures, and took them to his village in Enugu State, without informing their mother, Eme.
Eme never heard from Ikechukwu again until he was apprehended in Lagos. She had earlier reported the matter at Festac Police Station.
Somebody,
who later saw Ikechukwu, apprehended him and handed him over to the police at Cele Police Post.
Eme was later informed of Ikechukwu’s arrest.
Ikechukwu, who is now facing a two-count charge, promised the court to return the two children from where he had taken them.
But the man, said to be holding the children in custody, was said to have refused to let him return them to Lagos as ordered by the court.
The police prosecutor, Inspector Ejemli Augustine, while reading the first count charge against the accused, told the court that Ikechukwu Odoh,
“at about 1600 hours at Prayer Estate in the Apapa Magisterial District did steal two kids, Daniel Odoh ‘m,’ aged 10, and Kelechi Odoh, aged 7, and commit felony to wit stealing and thereby committed an offence contrary and punishable under Section 277 of the criminal Laws of Lagos State of Nigeria, 2015.”
In the second count charge, the prosecutor said Odoh “did steal two kids, Daniel Odoh ‘m’ and Kelechi Odoh, children of one Mrs. Eme Odoh ‘f’, of the same address and, thereby, committed an offence contrary and punishable under Section 277 of the criminal Laws of Lagos State of Nigeria, 2015.”
The accused pleaded not guilty to the two-count charge
The Presiding Magistrate, Mrs. M. O. Ajayi,
granted the accused bail in the sum of N100, 000, with one surety.
The magistrate also ordered that the man in whose custody the children have been kept should be produced in court at the next sitting.
The court also threatened to issue a bench warrant for the man’s arrest immediately it resumed from recess.
