A team of soldiers attached to OP MESA and policemen from Ajegunle Police Station have arrested seven suspected armed robbers who had been terrorising Ajeromi/Ifelodun local government area and its environs, in Lagos.
One of the robbery suspects, simply identified as Timothy, confessed to soldiers that he stole the army uniform from where it was hung on a rope to dry after the owner had washed the trousers and shirt clean.
The soldiers were said to have torn the rank insignia on the shirt before they began to punish the impersonator, who, it was believed, had been robbing people with guns and cutlasses.
This correspondent gathered that the soldiers bound the hoodlum’s hands and feet with a strong rope before pulling him on the ground, for having the effrontery to rob in an army uniform.
According to an eye witness, “Some residents in Ajegunle passed the good information to the police and soldiers and they went into action in an OP MESA patrol vehicle and an Ajegunle Police Station patrol vehicle to a particular joint at Agbo-Malu, Apapa, known as a den for illicit
drugs.
Timothy was arrested and he revealed the identity of members of his gang. He confessed that a member of his gang, Toeeb, popularly known as Fashola, usually kept the gun and slept in a hotel at Ajegunle. He was stripped stark naked.
Other suspected robbers were arrested inside a five-storey building near Opeleye street canal, Ajegunle, marked for demolition during the military
era.
One of the armed robbers used a long rug spread on the veranda of the second floor while trying to escape arrest.
The residents of the area, however, gave a hot chase and he was apprehended and handed over to the team of soldiers and police.
An eyewitness said, “Residents told the soldiers and policemen to leave the armed robbers for them, so that they would set them ablaze, complaining that if they were allowed to be charged to court, they would return to attack residents
again.
A resident of the area, exultant at the arrest of the suspects, said, “We thank God that the soldiers and policemen are now working together. If it’s only police they (the suspects) would have chased them away despite their guns and patrol vehicles… With this latest development now, I think Ajegunle will soon know peace. Many people have packed out of Ajegunle. Many young girls have been defiled. Many married women raped. Armed
robbers forcing sons to make love to their mothers. They force fathers to make love to their daughters. They had raped many to death in Ajegunle. “
