Seven suspects arrested by detectives in Ogun State Police Command have opened up on the roles each of them played to kill a ritual victim and the code names for body parts between them and their clients who purchase them.
The seven members of the serial ritual killing syndicate were apprehended by the detectives in different parts of the Abeokuta metropolis.
The suspects – Lekan Oladipupo (38) of Sotan village, Sulaiman Aremu (30) of Imala Elega Abeokuta, Ifayemi Madru (24) of Sotan village, Shittu Saheed (38) of Alarugbo village, Samod Sulaiman (35) of Sotan village, Akanji Moruf (23) of Alabata village and Tajudeen Adekunle (36) of Sapon Abeokuta – were arrested following a report lodged at Bode Olude divisional headquarters by one Abraham Okosun.
According to the police spokesman in the state, DSP Abimbola Oyeyemi, who confirmed the arrest, the complainant reported that he visited his brother, one Sunday Okosun, at Agbara village via Mawuko Abeokuta, only to discover that his brother had been brutally murdered by unknown person(s), and his remains had been dismembered.
“Upon the report, the Divisional Police Officer of Bode Olude Division, DSP Durojaye Rotimi, who visited the scene with his crack detectives, embarked on intelligence-based investigation to unravel those behind the dastardly act.
“Acting on credible information, the detectives traced and apprehended Lekan Oladipupo, who, on interrogation, confessed to being the actual person who shot and killed the deceased with his Dane gun. His confession led to the arrest of the other six suspects,” DSP Oyeyemi explained.
Thenewsbearer learnt that when the suspects were interrogated, each of them narrated their respective roles in the gruesome murder of the victim, and also about others who had been killed in similar circumstances.
Oladipupo had informed the police that his own role was to look for a victim, usually in the bush around Mawuko area, and shoot such a person to death.
“He would then contact Sulaiman Aremu, who will dismember the corpse of the victim and remove vital parts to be distributed to their standby customers,” the PPRO stated.
He gave the names of suspected clients as Ifayemi Badru, who purchased the heart, hands and other parts of the body; Shittu Saheed, who bought the head; Akanji Moruf, who bought the heart of another victim and Tajudeen Adekunle, who bought another head.
The suspects also confessed to having killed not less than four persons in similar circumstances, saying that their bodies parts were used for money-making rituals.
The clients informed the police that they had code names for each human part whenever they wanted to request it from the killers.
They were said to have normally referred to the human head as a ball, the heart as a transformer, while the hands were code-named as fans.
Saying that the gun and cutlass used for the killing had been recovered, Oyeyemi added that the state Commissioner of Police, Lanre Bankole, condemned the act, describing it as the height of man inhumanity to man.
CP Bankole also ordered that the suspects be transferred to the homicide section of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department for further investigation and subsequent arraignment in court after the conclusion.
