A woman and her two sons who had been kidnapped while being dropped at school have been rescued in Ibadan after police stormed the den where they were being held. The operation brought to an end an ordeal that had drawn wide attention, and it ended with two of the kidnappers killed during the raid. Police presented their account of the operation, including footage of the moment the hideout was stormed.
According to the police, the rescue was carried out on the directive of the Inspector General of Police, with the Commissioner of Police coordinating an intelligence led operation alongside police intelligence operatives. From the moment the family was seized, investigators said they remained on the trail of the perpetrators, working to locate the victims and identify those behind the abduction.
The breakthrough came through a string of arrests. A suspect who had been on the police watch list was taken into custody and, under interrogation, cooperated with investigators. His account led operatives to one of his fellow conspirators, and together the suspects explained how the kidnapping had been planned and carried out.
Police said the plot had taken shape around the middle of the month, when one of the conspirators approached a personal assistant to the family. Working from an analysis of the family's routines and digital footprints, the gang initially intended to seize the mother. On discovering that a driver usually took the children to school, they changed their plan to target the children instead.
On the day of the abduction, it was the mother who dropped the children at school, and the gang swung into action, seizing them and moving them to a den at a new location. The kidnappers then held the woman and her two sons while police pressed on with the search, acting on the standing directive to secure the victims and arrest those responsible.
The hideout was finally stormed on the sixth, at about half past seven, in the Ayegun area of Ibadan. As operatives moved in, a member of the gang who had travelled from Lagos to take part in the operation opened fire, and a second gang member also opened fire to cover him. Operatives returned fire and neutralised the two men before freeing the mother and her two sons, while a further suspect was arrested.
Police said the case again pointed to a familiar pattern, in which someone close to the victims is drawn into the plot. Investigators stressed that the operation had been intelligence led and conducted with care, and that the arrests and the rescue had followed the specific mandate handed down for the case.