Secondary school student in military outfit arrested for robbery

A Junior Secondary School (JSS) 2, student, Atoo Aondoana, has been held by the Police in Benue State for his alleged involvement in armed robbery along Makurdi-Alaide highway of the state. Aondoana alongside his accomplice, an elderly cleaner who works with the Nigeria Airforce in Makurdi, Peter Aghande, who is being held for supplying the military uniforms used for the robbery are currently helping the police with further information about their illegal activities.

State Commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni, yesterday paraded the duo alongside 29 other suspects of armed robbery and cultism at the Police headquarters in Makurdi.

Owoseni said that the suspects were arrested from various locations of the state between March 28 and April 3 for crimes mainly bordered on armed robbery and cultism.

He said one of the robbers whose gang specialised in robbing people along Makurdi-Lafia road was killed in the process as he engaged the police patrol team in a gun battle while the likes of Aondoana was apprehended in military uniform supplied by Aghande.

The police commissioner added that 13 different types of weapons were recovered from all the arrested suspects including sub-machine guns and one motor vehicle.

Speaking to Daily Trust in an interview, the 18-year-old suspected robber in military uniform who lives with his father at the Ikpayongo village in Gwer West local government area, near Makurdi admitted to the crime, explaining that he bought the military uniform from someone.

“We carry hunting guns for operation but I was not arrested with a gun. I had no weapon on me during my arrest. I’m a secondary school student in JSS2 at Ikpayongo. My father is a farmer and I’m the only child of my mother who is now married to another man in Makurdi,” he narrated.

Aondoana said he feels bad about his ill behaviour, stressing that a friend introduced him to the robbery gang.

On his part, the cleaner, Aghande, who brandished his identity card as a cleaner with the Nigerian Airforce, claimed that the Airforce personnel use to give him bad clothes (uniforms) to throw away and the boy (suspect) begged him to give them to him rather than disposing of them.

“But, I was shocked by the following day when I heard that the boy went to rob with it,” Aghande said.