Two members of a notorious kidnapping gang, Patrick Koyi and Chituru Ferdinand, have been arrested after the phone of the varsity lecturer which they kidnapped was traced to them.
According to the operatives of the Inspector General of Police Special Intelligence Response Team (IRT), Patrick and Chituru are notorious in Rivers State for kidnapping. They allegedly kidnapped a lecturer of the University of Port Harcourt, Emmanuel Chinasa Obi after collecting the huge sum of N1.1 million as ransom in September 2016.
A 24-year-old member of the dreaded cult group operating as kidnappers in Rivers State, Sunday Ogbonda, was also among those arrested.
Ogbonda was said to have been arrested for allegedly taking part in the January 9 murder of retired Deputy Superintendent of Police, Ikechi Dornata. He was however arrested when a mobile phone belonging to the late DSP was traced to him and he was allegedly tricked to a hotel in Port Harcourt, where he was eventually arrested.
The UNIPORT lecturer was murdered by his kidnappers after a ransom of N1.1 million was paid in two instalments to the kidnappers. The kidnappers, according to sources received a ransom of N700,000 from his relatives, while he was still alive and they received additional N400,000 after he was killed.
Relatives of the lecturer became apprehensive after paying the second instalment and the kidnapped lecturer was not released. They reportedly sent petitions to the IG, who drafted the IRT into the state. Koyi was then arrested in Port Harcourt with a Techno mobile phone belonging to the lecturer and he confessed to the crime before leading the operatives to his home where Ferdinand, who he said was one of the masterminds of the kidnap.
