Five suspected ritual killers have been arrested by policemen attached to the Kwara State Police Command in connection with the alleged murder of a commercial sex worker in Patigi in the Patigi Local Government Area of the state.
The suspects–Peter Tsado, Mohammed Gbara aka Madi, Abubakar Mohammed aka Mallam Baba Pati, Mohammed Ahmadu Nma and Bala Karin – were arrested in Patigi as well as Bida and Minna in Niger State. Three other suspects were said to be at large.
The police said the five suspects allegedly participated in the murder of Abigail who was picked up in a hotel in Patigi on June 29, 2021 but murdered for money ritual.
The Police Public Relations officer, Ajayi Okasanmi, in a statement on Friday, said a young man identified as Peter Tsado went to Victory Hotel, Patigi, to negotiate for the service of Abigail.
After agreeing on a term, Tsado reportedly took her on a motorcycle to his house in the town where he and one Mohammed Gbara strangled her and severed her head.
The police added that they later dumped the remaining part of her body in the bush before they took the head to Bida in Niger State to meet their accomplices.
The statement read in part, “On 29/6/2021 at about 23.08hrs, an unknown young person later identified as Samuel Peter Tsado of Patigi town in the Patigi Local Government Area of Kwara State, went to one Victory Hotel in Patigi and requested the service of a commercial sex worker by name Abigail, other names unknown. After the monetary negotiation of N5,000, both Peter and Abigail left the hotel premises to an unknown place. Ever since then, both of them were not seen again.
“On the receipt of the report of a missing person, the Commissioner of Police, who suspected foul play, directed the case be taken over by the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department for a discreet investigation. Investigation took detectives to Bida and Minna in Niger State where three other suspects were arrested. They confessed to the offence and also confessed to having been involved in an earlier ritual attempt using a hand of a yet-to-be-identified victim.
“The suspects took detectives to the bush where the carcass of the deceased was recovered. Efforts to recover the head of the deceased are still in progress as the custodian of the head is still at large, but he will certainly be arrested and brought to justice.”
Okasanmi said the suspects would be charged at the conclusion of investigation.
