A petitioner at the Osun State Judicial Panel of Inquiry on Police Brutality, Human Rights Violations and Related Extra Judicial Killings, Adeolu Sunday, has alleged that four business syndicates connived with some personnel of the Nigeria Police to defraud him of N36 million.
Sunday, who claimed to be a businessman supplying electrical appliances and installation, said this on Thursday at the panel sitting in Oshogbo.
Recounting his ordeals at the hands of the police, Sunday said: “I met one Mr. Kunle Ogunbanwo in 2016 who claimed to be a major supplier of electrical installations and we both agreed to do business together.
“I started sending money into the accounts to the tune of N36 million having taken me to his different warehouses in Lagos with the assurance of prompt delivery of all I applied for without knowing that he had an intention to dupe me.
“In the course of raising the money, I borrowed N1.8 million from one Mr. Abdulrahman Hasan Raji, a friend of mine who later went to report the case to police in Osogbo when I couldn’t pay him back as agreed.
“I was arrested on December 4, 2016 by Sergeant Muritala Muhammed and
late Inspector Femi Awoyemi both of Dugbe Police Station, Osogbo for failing to pay back the money I borrowed from the Raji. I was detained and tortured for seven days without trial.
“After seeing the evidence of different banks’ deposit tellers that showed that I had been defrauded, the policemen travelled to Lagos to effect the arrest of suspected criminal gang members. Though four of the suspected fraudsters were arrested through the account numbers that I sent the money to, to my surprise, the police later released them.
“One Sergeant Muritala Mohammed; CSP Babatunde Ogundairo (the then D.C.O, Dugbe Police Station, Osogbo), now the D.P.O Oke Odo Ota-Efun Police Station, Osogbo and Inspector Femi Awoyemi (now deceased) also at Dugbe Station, were the police officers involved in the matter.”
The counsel to the petitioner, Barr. K.A. Adebisi prayed the panel to order a fresh probe of the complaints of fraud by the petitioner against the main suspects (Kunle Ogunbanwo, Bello, and one Mr. Ayoola) and the policemen that arrested and later released them.
