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Delta State Police Command arrested five people on Friday, including the organizer and community head of a local festival in Ozoro, Isoko North Local Government Area, after videos circulated widely on social media showing groups of men assaulting, stripping, and sexually molesting women who were present in the community during the event the previous day — footage that generated a national outcry and prompted both state and federal condemnation within hours of going viral.
The community head and chief organizer of the event, Chief Omorede Sunday, was identified by Delta Police Public Relations Officer Bright Edafe as the primary suspect, arrested alongside four others from Oramudu quarters in Ozoro.
Commissioner of Police Aina Adesola immediately ordered their transfer to the State Criminal Investigation Department for further investigation, stating that all individuals found culpable would be identified, apprehended, and prosecuted.
Multiple videos that appeared on social media Thursday showed men physically tearing the clothing off women and groping them in public.
In one widely shared clip, a young woman was visible crying and attempting to hold her torn clothing together while surrounded by young men continuing to assault her. The material spread rapidly across Nigerian social media platforms and provoked immediate outrage from civil society organizations, activists, legal experts, and public figures.
The Delta State Government issued a formal condemnation on Friday.
“The Delta State Government strongly condemns the harassment of ladies and the reported cases of rape during the Ozoro Festival. Such barbaric acts are totally unacceptable and have no place in our society,” said Commissioner for Public Information Charles Aniagwu. The government also clarified that no cultural festival in Delta State permits or endorses sexual assault, directly rebutting characterizations of the incident on social media that described it as a “rape festival” — a framing that both the government and fact-checkers said fundamentally misrepresented the nature of the event.
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In its official statement, the Delta Police Command described the events as “criminal, inhumane, and a grave violation of the fundamental rights and dignity of victims,” and said that tactical and investigative assets had been deployed with a mandate to identify and apprehend all individuals involved. The spokesperson urged victims and witnesses to come forward, assuring that all information provided would be treated with strict confidentiality.
The police response drew pointed criticism from civil society observers who argued that the command’s reactive posture — acting only after the videos became a national news story — raised serious questions about institutional awareness and field intelligence.
Human rights activist Rinu Oduala challenged the police publicly on social media. “You are still waiting to be assured instead of already arresting people,” she wrote, accusing the police of swiftness in deploying against other targets while failing to prevent a documented outbreak of mass sexual violence at a public event. Others noted that the police had been entirely absent from the festival venue despite the gathering involving large numbers of people.
Commentators on social media also questioned whether the assaults were a new phenomenon or a recurrence of known behavior at the same festival in previous years. Some noted that if prior incidents had been reported, law enforcement’s continued absence from the location reflected a structural failure, not merely a failure of information.
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The police command called on residents to remain calm, vigilant, and law-abiding while investigations continued, reiterating its commitment to protecting lives and ensuring that all perpetrators were brought to justice.
Victims’ organizations and legal practitioners in Asaba and Warri called for the investigation to extend beyond the five arrested individuals to encompass all participants identifiable from the video evidence, which multiple observers noted captured the faces and sometimes the identities of many of those involved in the attacks.
A lawyer familiar with similar cases in Delta State noted that prosecution under the Violence Against Persons Prohibition Act — a federal statute with stronger sentencing provisions than some state-level equivalents — should be considered given the nature and scale of the alleged crimes.
The police did not confirm on Friday how many victims had come forward or whether any had undergone forensic medical examination.
The SCID is expected to continue taking statements and enlarging the circle of suspects as it processes the video evidence and interviews witnesses. Chief Omorede Sunday and the four other detainees had not been formally charged as of Friday evening, as the case remained in the investigative phase following its transfer to the criminal department.
