A 28-year-old armed robbery suspect, Mahmoud Mohammed, yesterday told policemen at the Olosan Division, Lagos State Command, how he and the two other members of his gang planned to attack persons who had gone to make withdrawals at Automated Teller Machines (ATMs).
Muhammad was arrested on Sunday by operatives of the division led by the Divisional Police Officer (DPO), Olosan Division, Mushin, Superintendent of Police Ayodele Arogbo.
The police said they were still trailing the two other suspects, who they said escaped.
Mohammed, who the police described as “a regular caller” at the Olosan station, confessed that he and the two others had been monitoring customer traffic at the different ATM locations in the Mushin area.
He said they mapped out the new plan to attack ATM customers since it had become extremely difficult for them to attack banks directly.
“We have gone to different banks to monitor ATM machines and discovered that people go to withdraw cash from the ATM mostly in the morning and in the evening. Armed with this information, we decided it would be wise to follow those who had gone to do withdrawal and snatch the cash from them at gun-point.
“It was quite unfortunate that we were following a customer whom we believed had gone to withdraw huge cash when the police spotted us. I think that they had been following us without us knowing.
“Three of us were riding on the same motorcycle at the time I was arrested but the other two were lucky to escape,” he added.
Muhammed, who claimed to be an indigene of Offa, Kwara State, confessed that his three-man armed robbery gang had been robbing customers at various banks in Lagos and other states.
He said many of the attacks on their victims were based on information on such persons’ transactions in the banks.
“Once a customer withdraws money from the bank, we will monitor and confirm it was a huge withdrawal. We will then trail such person to his house and rob him or her. We have successfully done that many times,” he said.
Our correspondent reliably learnt from a policeman attached to the team that foiled the robbery that their Divisional Police Officer (DPO) had got wind of the presence of the suspects in Mushin.
He said that the DPO, therefore, quickly requested men of the anti-robbery unit to follow him to mount a check-point along the Olorunsogo road in Mushin in anticipation that the robbers would fall into the trap.
“During the surveillance, we accosted three men on a motorcycle with a bag. The suspect holding the bag, 24-year-old Mohammed, resisted a search on it. Suddenly, the motorcycle rider zoomed off with his other colleague, leaving Mohammed, who had disembarked, behind.”
Muhammed was taken to the police station with the bag.
“We were shocked when we discovered that the bag contained four locally made short guns and 45 live ammunitions. Mohammed confessed that they were going for a robbery operation at an undisclosed bank in Lagos when they were caught,” the policeman said.
The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Bala Elkana, who confirmed the arrest and recovery of the arms, said that it came barely a few days after the DPO of the division had led another team
to effect the arrest of a gang of armed robbers.
Elkana said that the police had intensified investigation on the matter in order to arrest the other suspects still at large.
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