2 female shoppers raped in Abuja

Suspected armed robbers struck in Jahi area of Mabushi in Abuja during which they raped two women who went to shop in the area.
Police source said the incident happened last Thursday around 7.00p.m.
One of the victims, who spoke to our reporter from her hospital bed in Maitama, said that they (she and her friend) went to a supermarket in the area to buy some items and their car was parked opposite the supermarket because of the level of traffic in the area.
She said when they came out of the supermarket, they noticed that their car’s two front tyres were deflated.
“We were alarmed because it was around 7.00p.m., so we opened the car and put what we bought inside and decided to walk down Jahi road to look for a vulcaniser.
As we were going, we saw an unpainted car coming behind us with two male passengers. We saw that same car when we came out from the supermarket close to where we parked our car. They stopped and asked us where we were going to and we told them. They asked us to enter the car to connect us with a friend of theirs who was a vulcanizer. We entered and thanked them,” she narrated.
She said as soon as they moved, they immediately veered off onto a bushy area and the one in front the of car brought out a gun and pointed it on her head, while the other man was threatening her friend with a dagger.
According to her, the criminals took their handbags and phones and asked them to lie on the floor, adding that when they resisted, the driver slapped her and threw her on the floor.
“I used to hear stories about robbery attacks but what happened to me and my friend were stories that are difficult to tell as we were repeatedly raped by these men; our shouts and cries did not attract any member of the public as nobody came to our rescue.
“We were roughly handled and dumped by our attackers who left us with injuries all over our body. We managed to come out to the road. We saw some policemen and told them our story, they asked us to follow them to the police station for our statement, which we did before we went to the hospital. My fiancé was the one who finally went to bring the car home,” she said.
When the Mabushi divisional police officer, Chief Superintendent Ayobami Surajudeen, was contacted, he confirmed the incident but said he was not aware if they were raped.
He said that his patrol team recovered a pistol from the armed robbers while trying to escape upon sighting his men.