The family of a 28-year-old
Olayode Adeoye, who died after
policemen from the Elere
Division, Orile Agege, Lagos
raided Ajayi Igbe Street and
detained him with two others
have accused the police of
torturing him to death.

Saturday PUNCH learnt that
Adeoye and three friends were
having a drink at a bar on Ajayi
Igbe Street around 11am on
Thursday when the police team
in a commercial bus came to
arrest them.

“But we all came out to ask the
policemen who numbered about
six what the men had done
wrong, they gave no answer,” a
resident of the street told our
correspondent
Our correspondent visited the
street on Friday, where residents
who gathered in groups
discussing the incident in anger
said they had earlier marched in
protest to the Elere Police
Division, but were dispersed
with
gunshots.

An elder brother of the
deceased,
Mr. Tajuden Oyelola, said he had
still not been able to digest why
the police would beat Adeoye to
death.

“Those who were there when
they were arrested and those
who saw him when he was
taken to the hospital said he was
tortured. I am still in shock. How
could any human being do that
to another human being?”

A resident, Kafilat Oyenusi said
the men were arrested in her
sister’s bar.

Oyenusi said, “These men were
having a drink like any other
person. We all know them as
easy going men on the street.

When the police took the men
away, they came back about one
hour later for my sister. We
asked
why they came to take my sister
away but one of the policemen
threatened to shoot us.

“We followed them to the station
and that was where we learnt
that the men had actually
admitted to being ‘Yahoo
boys’ (a
Nigerian term for Internet
fraudsters). The boys said the
policemen asked them to bail
themselves with N500, 000 but
they said they could only pay
N40, 000. That was when the
policemen began to beat them.

We later left the place hoping
that we would come back in the
evening.
“But we got a report around
4pm that Olayode had slumped
in the cell and was taken to the
hospital. By 1am this morning
(Friday), he was dead.”

The landlord of the deceased
said even though he was not
aware that the men were
Internet fraudsters, he was
aware they admitted that much
to the police and saw no reason
why they should have been
tortured.

“The three boys were easy going
men. The police actually came to
search their apartment and took
away their laptops,” he said.

Another resident told our
correspondent that the three
men were his friends and that
another friend of theirs who
went to the police station was
also detained.

“When he was detained, he told
us that they were beaten and
Olayode was actually strung up
before he collapsed and they
asked him to take Olayode to the
All Souls Infirmary, where he
died.”

At the hospital which was few
metres from the police station, a
doctor said they had nothing to
say as it was a police matter.

The divisional police officer, Mr.
Philip Eze, said the matter was
being transferred to the State
Criminal Investigation
Department and he could not
comment since he was not the
police spokesperson.

But a police officer, who was
aware of the case at the station
said under condition of
anonymity that the matter did
not happen as the residents
alleged.

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