General Overseer, six others held over international Airport robbery

Pastor Ibikunle

The Lagos State Police Command has arrested the gang of robbers, which attacked the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, on March 13, 2013, killing two policemen and injuring several citizens.

The gang of robbers were also said to be the same bandits, which attacked a Bureau De Change last year(2012) at the same airport, carting away dollars, valued at over N600 million.

Among the suspects presently in police custody, is one Pastor Ibikunle Olanrewaju John, a General Overseer of ‘The Way of Joy’ church, located at the Ikotun Egbe area of Lagos State.

The Commissioner of Police, Prince Umar Manko said the catch were caught after detectives attached to the Special Anti-robbery Squad (SARS), recovered the corpse of one of the slain robbers, identified as Teslim Okunola a.k.a Esho, and discovered some items on him. Those items were used to catch seven of the suspects now in police detention.

Items recovered from the suspects are; five AK47 rifles, four dynamites, two locally made pistols, 64 AK47 magazines, all loaded with 30 rounds, totaling, 1920 live ammunitions. There are also a Toyota Sienna space bus with registration number BDG918AG, two masks and some quantity of charms buried in an iron box and hidden in their hideout, deep inside the forest at Agoro Village in Odogbolu Local Government area of Ogun State.

Recalling that incident which occurred on March 13, on the turf of the airport command, Manko explained that  after the airport Commissioner of forwarded certain of the items recovered from the dead robber, Esho, SARS men had taken over the investigation, leading to success.

Manko added: “On March 13, at about 7:30pm, an incident happened, where robbers went to International Airport and killed two policemen. Those two policemen served at Apapa command. They went on official engagement and got killed by the bandits who came to rob the international airport. The robbers succeeded in wrecking havoc. But before he was killed, one of the policemen fought gallantly, killing one of the robbers (Esho). He also made sure that other members of the robbery gang were not able to take his corpse away. It was that corpse that led to the catching of the gang.

“These robbers are not based in Lagos. They’re from Ondo, Osun, Oyo and Ogun. They also attacked airport last year, making away with 2 million dollars, valued in Nigerian currency to be N600 million.

“All the suspects have confessed to the armed robbery at the airport and several other deadly robberies in Lagos, Ogun, Ondo and Kwara States. The robberies include such as the Oro First Bank/Union Bank armed robbery in Kwara State in January 2013. First Bank/Wema Bank armed robbery in Ikirun in Osun State on December 2012 and the Bullion Van armed robbery attack at Odogbolu junction along Lagos Ijebu-Ode Expressway in January 2013. They also confessed to the armed robbery attack at the Murtala Mohammed International in February 2012. Investigation is not yet concluded. We’re still looking for two other members of the gang.”