The suspects, according to the police spokesman, DSP Daniel Ndukwe, were shot dead during a gun battle with the law enforcement agents while the abducted victim was rescued.
The Nigeria Police Force, Enugu State Command, has said its operatives neutralised two members of a kidnapping gang terrorising the state.
The suspects, according to the police spokesman, DSP Daniel Ndukwe, were shot dead during a gun battle with the law enforcement agents while the abducted victim was rescued.
Ndukwe, in a statement issued on Monday night, said the operation was conducted by a combined team of police operatives, adding it also followed the policing thrust and the renewed crime-fighting impetus of the Commissioner of Police, Kanayo Uzuegbu.
He said, "A combined team of police operatives drawn from the NPF Special Forces, Awkunanaw Police Division and Tactical Teams of the Enugu State Command, led by the Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of Operations, DCP Olasoji Akinbayo, on Sunday, August 20, 2023, at about 8pm, rescued a male kidnap victim (names withheld) at Centenary, along Enugu/Port-Harcourt Expressway, after a gunfight with the hoodlums.
“One of the miscreants, simply identified as “Baron”, was neutralised on the spot in the ensuing shootout, while others escaped with varying degrees of gunshot wounds.
“The victim’s black-coloured Lexus 350 Jeep was recovered alongside 1 locally made revolver gun loaded with for 4 cartridges and another locally fabricated pistol belonging to the criminal elements.
“However, further manhunt of the fleeing members of the gang led to the discovery and recovery of the lifeless body of the second neutralised hoodlum, simply identified as Chukwunonso a.k.a. “Nolly”, in the morning hours of today, 21/08/2023, in a forest at the location of the gun duel.
“The two neutralised members of the criminal gang have been on the criminals’ watch list of the Command, while the operational success was due to the Operatives’ swift response to a distress call on the kidnap of the victim, along Agbani Road Enugu, in the said night."
Ndukwe, however, quoted CP Uzuegbu, to have commended the Operatives for quickly adapting to his newly introduced crime-fighting strategies. He also tasked them and all other police personnel of the command to sustain the tempo, stressing that there would be no breathing space for unrepentant criminals in the State, under his watch as the Commissioner of Police.