The police authorities have rearrested an inmate who recently escaped from the prison in Imo State, South-East Nigeria.
Some 1,844 prisoners were freed when gunmen attacked the prison headquarters in Owerri on April 5. The police headquarters in the state was similarly attacked by gunmen.
Francis Enobore, the spokesperson of the correctional centre, said the gunmen used explosives to blast their way through the centre’s administrative block before gaining entrance into the prisons yard.
In a statement issued on Monday, the police spokesperson in Imo State, Ikeokwu Godson Orlando, identified the rearrested inmate as Eze Obinna, from Amaimo, Ikeduru Local Government Area of the state, adding that he was in series of kidnap incidents lately.
“The operatives while acting on the directives of the Commissioner of Police, CP ABUTU YARO, fdc to rid Imo state of crime and criminality to take the war against violent crime to the den of the hoodlums, as well as rearrest the escapee inmates of the Correctional services stormed Obinze, Owerri West LGA, Imo State, arrested the said Eze Obinna whom has since his escape from the prison, formed another deadly kidnap gang and have been terrorising Owerri and environs,” he said.
According to the police, the suspect was arrest in December 2020 by the operatives of the Anti-Kidnapping Unit, for kidnapping a victim, where he personally transferred the sum of five million naira from the victim’s Bank account to his own account.
He was said to have and later collected the sum of four million Naira cash, as ransom from the same victim, while the victims Toyota Venza car is yet to be recovered.
Three AK-47 rifles with a large number of ammunition were also recovered from him and his accomplices then.
Meanwhile, the Commissioner of Police has ordered the arrest of all his gang members, as well as mopping up their operational arms, noting that the investigation is ongoing.
