Three suspected car thieves arrested in Cross River

Three suspected car thieves have been arrested by the Cross River State Police Command, over the alleged robbery of a household in Calabar, the state capital.

It was learnt that the car thieves, carried out the operation in the victims’ house and made away with a 2018 Corolla Toyota worth N8 million.

It was also gathered that when the alarm was raised about the robbery, the Anti Kidnapping/Cultism Team (AKCT), tracked the robbers from Calabar to Uyo, the state capital of Akwa Ibom, apprehended them and recovered the stolen car.

Findings showed that they had already put the car worth 8 million naira up for sale at a Car stand in Uyo, for just N1 million, before the AKCT apprehended them.

Speaking with journalists on Tuesday in Calabar, the Cross River State Commisioner of Police, Abdulkadir Jimoh, said they would never relent in giving criminals a run for their money as the police was determined to rid the state of all forms of crime and criminality.

Read also: Security guard ignores car thieves because ‘he was praying’

He said: “In line with our open door policy at it concerns information sharing by giving the people feed back as well as carrying the people of Cross River State along in our progress and achievement, we have just apprehended a notorious robbery gang who specializes in robbing filling stations and snatching cars.

“After robbing their victim in Calabar, they took his 2018 Toyota Corolla which cost over 8 million to a car stand at Uyo without knowing that we were tracking them.

”They were intercepted at about 12: 00 midnight, Tuesday in synergy with our people in Akwa Ibom, we arrested them and brought them back to Calabar and they all confessed to the crime and will be charged to Court immediately investigation is concluded.“

However, one of the Suspect, Francis Archbong, aged 28, said the value of the car was unknown to them, reason they wanted to sell the car for N1 million.

”I used to be a carpenter before going into driving but I didn’t know the value of the car and we needed to make quick cash.

”The car was handed over to me by Etete (one of the robbers), so I drove it to Akwa Ibom to sell it there, but to tell you the truth I didn’t know the car is up to eight million naira, if I knew I won’t place it at one million naira,” he said.

By Emmanuella Ibe…

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