The two officers were summoned to appear before the panel on December 17, 2020.
Two Chief Superintendents of Police of the Ogida division, Benin City, have been summoned by the Edo State Judicial Panel of Inquiry listening to victims of the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad.
The two officers were summoned to appear before the panel on December 17, 2020.
The panel said that they were summoned to clarify their roles in the alleged assault and extortion of one Mrs. Patience Okundaye, 61.
Okundaye told the panel that some group of persons prevented an attempted attack on her son, adding that one of the thugs was arrested and handed over to the police.
However, she explained that the suspect escaped with handcuffs while still in custody due to the carelessness of the police.
She said, “On January 5, 2019, some group of boys wanted to attack my son, but with the help of some youths in the area, they apprehended one of them and took him to the police station.
“But later, the police complained that the boy they arrested and brought before them has an injury.
“So, the police took the boy to the police health centre with handcuffs on his hands, but less than 45 minutes later, they called my son to say that the boy in handcuffs had escaped.
“Then the police invited us to come to the station and on getting there, we found out that the boy had escaped.
“So, I wrote to the DPO complaining to him that since the suspect had escaped, our lives were no longer safe.
“From there, we went to the State Headquarters where I narrated my story; the Commissioner of Police then ordered the Anti-cultist unit of the command to come and watch over my house until the police were able to fish out the criminal.
“They only came to watch over my house on February 5. On March 6. But in the afternoon, police came to my house, burst my gate, turned my house upside down and all the boys that were present were arrested.
“The further told me that my children were criminals, and I told them that my children were not criminals.”
Okundaye, who brought a plasma TV set to the panel to play the recorded video of how the disbanded SARS raided her house and assaulted her, said they regularly turned her into an Automated Teller Machine.
“They dragged me to the police station with only wrappers and singlets on my body, loaded my vehicle with the drinks we were to use on Sunday and went away with them.
“To cut the story short, my son spent N600,000 to bail all those who were arrested in my compound. He also paid N200,000 to bail me and my last born.
“Others spent close to a week in the cell before they were bailed," she told the panel. She pleaded with the panel to invite the said police officers and recommend adequate sanction for them.
“What I want from this panel is that the policemen who were involved in this activity should be summoned to appear before this panel and they should be prosecuted," she said.
The chairman of the panel, Justice Ada Ehigiamusoe, however, ordered that the said officers should appear before the panel on December 17 2020.