Police in Akwa Ibom have detained a woman suspected of fabricating her own abduction.
Waheed Ayilara, the state’s commissioner of police, revealed this to reporters on Friday during a briefing in Uyo.
He added that 52 people were detained by police officers for a variety of crimes, including fraud, kidnapping, armed robbery, child trafficking, cultism, and murder.
One such instance is a woman who planned her own kidnapping; she is from Nung Oku village in Akwa Ibom’s Ibesikpo Asutan Local Government Area.
Following her demand for N4 million in ransom, Akwa Ibom State Police Command agents managed to capture her.
“A report was received on Monday from one Enobong Sampson that her sister had been kidnapped and that the kidnappers were demanding N4m as ransom,” he said.
“As a result, operatives of Anti-kidnapping Squad of the Command embarked on an intense and intelligence-driven operation to track down the kidnappers and rescue the victim.
“On Tuesday, however, the purported victim and her boyfriend were arrested at a hideout at Mbierebe Obio, Ibesikpo Asutan Local Government Area.
“She confessed to have conspired with her boyfriend and three others to proclaim her kidnap to raise money from her aunty based outside the country.”
The police commissioner said that on Wednesday, police arrested a man at Uruting village in Okobo Local Government Area of the state for killing his 75-year-old father, using a machete.
According to the police commissioner, the suspect’s motivation was that his late father had sold every piece of land he owned, including the one he had given him to build his home.
Ayilara added that on March 8, authorities detained a man in Ayam village, located in the state’s Etinan Local Government Area, on suspicion of producing phony goods and contaminated fruit beverages.
Additionally on March 8, police saved and apprehended a man who was about to be set ablaze but for the intervention of police officers and had been defrauding innocent bystanders using Point of Sale devices.
The majority of the man’s victims, according to Ayilara, knew who he was, and N350,000 in cash had been taken from him at the time of his arrest.
The police commissioner promised that as soon as the investigations were finished, all of the accused would be charged.