A robbery suspect, Sodiq Sulaiman, has said that he is an expert in stealing parked tricycles.
Sulaiman said he and his gang members sold at Mushin, in Mainland Lagos, each tricycle they stole at N40,000.
Sulaiman and another suspect, Saidi Ibrahim, were arrested on Sunday by operatives of the Lagos State Task Force who were on night patrol.
The task force officials, who described Sulaiman as an ex-convict, told our correspondent that the suspect confessed that he and his gang members had stolen a tricycle at Ifo, Ogun State, and were taking it to Idi-Oro, Mushin, where they intended to sell it when they were arrested.
Sulaiman said, “I was released from the Kirikiri Prison, Lagos, last month where I spent seven months for not being able to produce a commercial tricycle the owner had given me on hire purchase.
“I was trained as a tricycle mechanic for four years at Abekoko, Oyo State, before I came to Lagos in the year 2017. I graduated from stealing phones and bags to stealing tricycles, which I was doing with Saidi Ibrahim, whom I met at Akala, Mushin.”
The other suspect, Ibrahim, a bricklayer, also confessed that before both of them started stealing tricycles, they were using motorcycle to snatch bags, phones and other valuable items.
“We had stolen and sold more than 55 phones, jewelries, laptops and seven tricycles to one ‘man’ at Idi-Oro, Mushin. We sold all our stolen items to the man and some others at the Ido-Oro and Akala areas of Mushin,” he stated.
The Chairman, Chief Superintendent of Police Olayinka Egbeyemi, disclosed that preliminary investigation revealed that the two suspects stole a tricycle, registration number JJJ 706 QF, from where the owner parked it at Ifo.
Egbeyemi said, “They refused to stop when our officers ran after them. They sped off and later abandoned the tricycle on the road, but our officers caught up with them at Cappa bus stop.”
He added that the Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Zubairu Muazu, had directed that the two men be charged to court immediately.
