One of the inmates who escaped during the attack on the Imo State Correctional Centre in Owerri, Onyekachi Alozie, is back on the radar of the police.
This time around, he is wanted for using his wife, Oluchi Alozie from Nkume community in Njaba Local Government Area, Imo State, for kidnapping.
Oluchi has confessed to the crime, saying her husband and his gang members use her to lure men out of their homes to lonely roads to be kidnapped.
Oluchi was arrested by operatives of the Imo State Police Command following the kidnap of 75-year-old Chief Okoli Precious, who was reported missing by his son, Fabian Ubochi.
Oluchi, who was paraded before newsmen by the Commissioner, Imo State Police Command, Rabiu Hussaini, said Alozie makes her to pretend to fall in love with would-be kidnap victims before their eventual seizure by the gang.
She said it was the same process that she was used to lure Precious to their residence at Nkume in Njaba LGA, Imo State.
She later took him to a lonely place where the husband and his gang members kidnapped and took him to an unknown destination.
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Hussaini said the suspect was arrested following a report by Ubochi that Precious had been murdered by his abductors after he was kidnapped in Orlu at about 3:30pm on December 8.
The CP added: “Following a kidnap incident in Orlu on 8/12/2021 at about 1530hrs of one Chief Okoli Precious ‘M’ aged 75yrs and was reported on 12/11/2021, by his son, one Fabian Ubochi, where it was suspected that he had been murdered by his abductors.”
Hussaini said following the report, the command’s Anti-Kidnapping Unit, through technical analysis of intelligence, was able to identify, locate and arrest one Agubata Maxwel Joel Chimezie and the victim’s ash colour vehicle was recovered from a spray painter’s workshop, where he had taken it to change the colour.
He said: “On interrogation, he made a confessional statement revealing how they kidnapped the victim and led the police detectives to the house of his accomplice.
“On arrival at the house of the suspect, one Onyekachi Alozie on sighting the police jumped down from a storey building and took to his heel.
“Thus, his wife, Oluchi Alozie ‘F’, was arrested and taken to the police station.”
Hussaini said on interrogation, Oluchi confessed to have played prominent roles the the kidnappings carried out by her husband and his gang.
He added: “She further revealed that it was the husband, Onyekachi, who hatched the plan with his gang members to use her to lure the victim out of his house to a lonely place where he was kidnapped.
“It may interest you to know that Agubata Maxwell Joel Chimezie and Onyeka Alozie met themselves in the Nigerian Correctional Service, Owerri, Imo State, where they were standing trial on criminal charges ranging from armed robbery to kidnapping and human trafficking, before the April 5, 2021 jail break where they escaped, regrouped and formed a new syndicate of kidnapping and armed robbery gang.
“Again, in the course of our investigation, it was revealed that Oluchi Alozie was having an affair with the kidnapped victim, Chief Precious Okoli, and her husband, Onyekachi Alozie, was aware of it and used her to lure him to her resident at Nkume in Njaba LGA of Imo State, and later, they moved to a lonely road where her husband and his gang members came out of the bush, kidnapped him at gunpoint and zoomed in his car to an unknown destination.”
The Eagle