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As the law intensifies its clamdown on the perpratrators of one of the most heinous kidnappings and murder that Anambra State has ever seen, a 70-year-old native doctor believed to be working for the gunmen that beheaded an Anambra lawmaker, Okechukwu Okoye has been arrested.
One of the gunmen, who was arrested last week claimed that they were working with the native doctor who was at large.
The native doctor was said to have been traced to Unubi, in Nnewi South local government area of Anambra State.
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Anambra State Public Relations Officer, PPRO, Mr. Tochukwu Ikenga, however, declined to speak on the arrest, saying that he would not want to speak on the matter so as not to jeopardize investigations.
“We don’t want to disclose some of our strategies. Let them know that the police command is not folding its hands in unmasking these killers.
“These things are intelligence-driven and there are already eyewitnesses. In due time, we will let Nigerians know as we will bring all the perpetrators to book
“Please, help us to tell Nigerians that a lot is being done.”
A human rights group, the International Society for the Rule of Law had in a publication yesterday said the 70-year-old herbalist was apprehended by officers of the Department of State Services ( DSS).
Chairman of the board of directors of the group, Mr. Emeka Umeagbalasi said the arrest was in connection with the abduction, disappearance, beheading and decapitation of Hon Okechukwu Okoye, an Isuofia Aguata-born Anambra State Assembly lawmaker who was abducted on 15th May 2022.
He said that the native doctor was technologically trailed after he was found to have used the beheaded lawmaker’s sim-card to make criminal calls, adding that even after exhausting the sim-card ‘credit’, he completed the calls with his own cell phone.
He added, “The slayers of the beheaded lawmaker were earlier traced to Unubi where ransom running into millions of naira was physically delivered. The slayers collected the ransom and still went ahead to slay and decapitate the lawmaker.”
“The cell phone of the slain lawmaker was put in monitoring devices during which it was found to have been used by the 70-year-old herbalist to make several criminal calls days after he was beheaded.
“It was at this juncture that one of the ‘soft targets’ was arrested in Igboukwu leading to third party identification and location of the arrested kingpin.
“Between early hours of 28th (last Friday) and 29th (last Saturday) May 2022, the house of the arrested kingpin was raided after he was tracked to be at home.
“He made a magical escape after several gunshots were fired at him and he escaped by jumping into a ditch. After recovering several incriminating items, including guns and bullets and his portrait, the operatives trapped him by leaving behind one of his cell phones. Between 30th May and early hours of 31st May 2022, the cell phone was tracked to a private hospital in Awka, forcing the operatives of the DSS to storm the clinic where he was arrested alive in bandage while trying to board a tricycle”.
