Army Nabs Four Kidnappers, As Police Kill Kingpin In Rivers

Gallant soldiers of the Nigerian Army, 29 Battalion have arrested four high-profile kidnapping suspects in Rivers State.
The Army said in a statement in Port Harcourt, that the kidnap suspects, who have been terrorising the state, include, Dumbari Bro, Gbariko Kariloba, Victor Dokara, and Confidence Friday.
It was learnt that the suspects would soon be handed over to the police for further investigations, and possible prosecution.
However, the authorities of the Rivers State Police Command have confirmed the killing of “a notorious kidnap gang leader’’, Linus Lebari, 35, popularly known as Bobby/Devil, who has been terrorising Ogoni area of the state in recent times.
The command’s spokesman, DSP Nnamdi Omoni, who disclosed this in Port Harcourt, said that operatives from the Bori Police Station, in a coordinated operation, trailed the deceased and his gang to their hideout in a forest at Okwale in the boundary between Rivers and Abia states.
He said that when the hoodlums noticed irregular movements around their camp, they started shooting randomly.
Omoni said the police returned fire and fatally wounded one of them, identified as Linus Lebari, the leader of the kidnap gang.
“The gang is responsible for all the attacks on the Ogoni axis of the East-West Road and whose gang has killed over 30 people in Khana and Gokana local government areas after collecting ransom,’’ he said in a statement.
According to Omoni, in the wake of the operation, two policemen sustained gunshot wounds and are currently responding to treatment.
“One locally made pistol and some cartridges were recovered, and efforts are on to arrest other gang members who fled with gunshot wounds,’’ he added.
Omoni quoted the Commissioner of Police in Rivers, Mr Mustapha Dandaura, as assuring the public that onslaught against banditry in the state would continue until all criminal elements were eliminated.