Men of the Ondo State Security Network Agency popularly known as Amotekun, in collaboration with security agencies in Kogi State, have rescued six kidnapped corps members.
Two leaders of the kidnap gang were also arrested by the security outfit after the payment of N1 million out of the N2 million ransom demanded before the release of the corps members.
The victims, three males and three females, were kidnapped in the late hours of last Tuesday while travelling from Ondo town to Kaduna State for the mandatory national youth service programme.
Confirming the development, the state Commander of Amotekun, Chief Adetunji Adeleye explained that one of the victims, who is from Ondo town contacted her family who informed the security outfit of their abduction.
“We received a distress call from a family member of one of the victims who is an indigene of Ondo State, from Ondo town that one of their family members, who was on her way to orientation camp in Kaduna State had been kidnapped.,” he stated.
“We succeded in getting the location of the victims and the contact number of the kidnappers who had contacted the families of the victims for ransom and tracked the account the payment was made into.
“We got their location which showed that they were somewhere around Ijara in Kogi State, not too far from Kabba and deployed our men who worked with other security agencies to the location.
We were able to discover three locations and we realised that the victims are right in the middle of the kidnappers and we ensured that they were rescued unhurt. We were there for almost two days, mounting pressure on them. We did lots of tracking to get to their location.
“They wanted N10 million, but we were able to reduce it to N2m and we stylishly agreed and asked them to send an account number where the money would be sent to.
“We sent N1m into the account and tracked the owner of the account. We realised it was an account in Kogi State. We went after the Kidnappers and with the support of the DPO of the affected area, we succeeded.”
Adetunji said two of the suspects were arrested, including the owner of the bank account but said the two suspects had been handed over to the Kogi State Police Command, while the six victims regained their freedom.
[LIB]