Church robbers meet Waterloo

The popular adage, many days for the thief, one day for the owner of the house, came through when two armed robbery suspects were arrested by men of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the Federal Capital Territory Police Command in Abuja.

The two suspects who belonged to a gang of four robbers that specialized in joining genuine worshippers to attending Sunday ser­vices and then returning to steal the offering for the day from the same churches, met their waterloo after robbing the Kingdom Connection Church, Jabi Daki-Biyu and St. Matthew Catholic Church in Karmo Abuja.

In a brief chat with Sunday Sun, one of the arrested sus­pects, Isaac Nyam, 35, con­fessed that he was among the gang that robbed the church, and explained the modus operandi of the gang.

His words: “We specialized in robbing churches in Abuja.

Usually one member of our gang would attend service in the church before we go to rob the place. When the ser­vice is on, we will watch what they are doing, especially during the offering time. We will watch where the ushers take the offering box after the service and in the night we go back for the operation.”

Armed with the intelligence gathered, the FCT Commis­sioner of Police, Mr. Wil­son Inalegwu said that gang struck on June 15, 2015, at the Kingdom Connection Min­istry around 3.00am, where they overpowered the two se­curity men. They also tied up some members of the church living within the premises of the church; the gang then gained access into the audito­rium and carted away the of­fering, musical instruments, laptops, GSM handsets and also removed the brain box of church’s Toyota Hummer bus.

Done with their unholy deed, the gang departed, glad­dened that it had executed a successful heist, but prov­idence turned the table on them as information was re­layed to the police command, and SARS operatives were activated to go smoke out the culprits.

Through diligent investiga­tions, the police located and stormed the hideout of the gang. Two members of the gang were arrested while the other two escaped with bullet wounds. The police recov­ered an English Berata pistol and three other pistols from the gang.

Commenting on the rob­bery experience, a member of Kingdom Connection Church, Mr. Philp Oseni said: “We were shocked when they came; they tied up the two se­curity men on duty and some of our members living with­in the church premises and went straight to where we keep the offering box.”

The Commissioner of Po­lice assured that the suspects would be charged to court soon.