13 Highway Kidnappers Arrested, 18 Guns Recovered

The police have arrested members of two notorious kidnap gangs along the Abuja-Kaduna highway and recovered two AK 47 rifles, 16 locally-made guns, cutlasses and charms.

The Force Public Relations Officer, Jimoh Moshood, said in a statement that 13 of the hoodlums were paraded at Jere along the Kaduna-Abuja highway on Thursday.

The suspects included the leader, Umar Babuga, 27; Umaru Kiri, 26; Abdullahi Tambaya; Abdulkarim Musa, 27; Isah Musa, 30, and others.

Moshood said the arrests were the result of the deployment of additional two units of special police forces in the road to complement ‘Operation Absolute Sanity’ on the Abuja-Kaduna highway.


He added that the new units, which were relocated to some roads around the Jere-Abuja areas, arrested the suspects in their hideouts and camps and also rescued some of their victims.

The FPPRO added, “In the operation that is still ongoing, two different vicious and notorious kidnap-for-ransom gangs were dislodged in their hideouts and camps between Jere-Kaduna and Jere-Abuja axis.

“A total of 13 suspected kidnappers were arrested in the operation and they confessed to the offence and admitted to the various criminal roles they played in the commission of the crime.”

Moshood stated that the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, had directed the Assistant IGPs and commissioners of police in the zones and commands to replicate the same anti-kidnap operation on the highways and major roads in other parts of the country.

“They are also to beef up security in their areas of responsibilities and ensure massive deployment of armed police personnel, patrol teams and undercover operatives in black spots, flashpoints and other vulnerable criminal spots to nip in the bud all forms of crimes and criminality nationwide,” the police spokesman said.