Abductors of catholic priest meet Waterloo

The trio of Chinedu Odomena, Uzoma Mejuru and Ogadinma Ajonuma, who did not obey the scriptural injunction that says, “Touch not my anointed and do my prophet no harm,” are now cooling their heels in the custody of the Anti-Kidnapping Unit of the Imo State Police Command for the abduction of Reverend Father Charles Nwachukwu, the parish priest of Amauzari in Isiala Mbano Local Government Area of the state on June 16, 2017.

Imo State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Chris Ezike, said that the suspects, Chinedu Odomena, 24, Ogadinma Ajonuma, 20 and Uzoma Mejuru, 48, who are from Umuokpo Abaja in Nwangele Local Government Area, Imo State, abducted the priest on the fateful day about 8pm, along Umunkwo/Abaja road in Nwangele LGA.

He disclosed that on receiving the report of the incident, the operatives of the Anti-Kidnapping Unit deployed a high-tech tracking device, which enabled them to track down Ajonuma, a native of Umuokpo Abaja in Nwangele LGA and arrested him on June 18, 2017. He then led detectives to the Umuokpo forest where the Catholic priest was rescued unhurt.

Giving insight to the breakthrough, Ezike said: “Ogadinma Ajonuma who was first arrested confessed to the crime and led the operatives of the Anti-Kidnapping Unit to Umuokpo forest where the Catholic Priest was rescued on unhurt on 18 June, 2017. Subsequently, when the house of Odomena, alias Miliki, was searched the car keys of the Highlander SUV of the priest was found on him and he led the to where the vehicle was parked at Umuocham in Abaja Nwangele, in readiness for onward movement to where it would be sold.

The suspect further confessed that he had been involved in the kidnapping of one man from Ifeakala on October 16, 2016 and the abduction of the owner of St Cosi Petroleum station along Egbu Road, Owerri.

Ezike further revealed that the suspects wre cooperating with investigation and had disclosed the identities of their cohorts, who are now at large.

The Imo State police boss said that the suspects had committed sacrilege by abducting a priest and demanding ransom from him.

He said that the suspects took the priest’s ATM cards and asked him to pay ransom. Two of the suspects, he added, had already confessed but the third person was still denying his involvement in the kidnapping.

However, narrating his ordeal in the hands of his abductors, Fr. Nwachukwu said: “I went tom drop my boss in Port Harcourt. As I was going back to my station at Amauzari in Isiala Mbano, four armed young men ambushed me along the Umuokpo Abaja in Nwangele Local Government Area and I told them that I am a priest but one of them dragged me out from the driver’s seat and they warned me not to make any noise.

“They pushed me into the back seat of my car but when they wanted to drive off the SUV got stuck and when they could not pull it out they had to bring an Okada man. I sat in the middle while one of them sat behind me and I was blindfolded so I did not know the actual place I was being taken to. But I later found that I was taken to a forest that night and it was when we got there that they demanded for a ransom of N100 million and I told them that am a priest, then they reduced it to N50million and later N10million.  I made them to understand that I don’t have that kind of money because I come from a poor family.”

Nwachukwu further said that when the abductors sighted the two ATM cards he had with him, one of them snatched it from him. He explained to the abductors that one card belonged to him while the other belonged his colleague.

“I was forced to give them the pin codes of the ATM cards and they warned me that if PIN was not correct that they would kill me and pour diesel on my dead body. So, one of the suspects who had already gone to the bank with the ATM cards that night was communicating with them said he had made a withdrawal of about N500,000 from the other ATM that belongs to my colleague which is a school account. I am sure that if I had not given them the correct pin they would have killed me.”