The Delta State Police Command has exhumed the decomposing body of Mrs Philomina Ogadi, a 54-year-old who was abducted, murdered and buried in a shallow grave in a farmland near the Benin-Agbor-Onitsha expressway, Agbor, Delta State.
The body of the woman was exhumed four days after her burial by kidnappers who had collected a ransom of N650,000 from her family.
Ogadi was abducted last week by a nine-man gang, including her neighbour.
One of the suspects was living in the same apartment with the victim before she was abducted.
One of the kidnappers now in police custody led the state’s Deputy Commissioner of Police, Operations, Faleye Olayele, and other officers to the scene where the body of the victim was exhumed and taken to the mortuary.
Briefing journalists at the State Police headquarters in Asaba, the Commissioner of Police, Mr Ari Mohammed Ali, said the woman was declared missing by her son.
He disclosed that her body was exhumed with gunshot injuries on her head, blindfolded, despite ransom paid to her abductors. He assured that the police would unravel the real circumstances behind the murder of the victim and bring all the culprits to book.
Ari said: “Having killed the woman and buried her in a shallow grave, they did not stop there, they went on calling the children and collected ransom. So far, they have collected N650,000 from her children after killing the woman. They made the children believe that their mother was still alive. They did a video recording of their mother and played before the children, making them believe that she was still alive.”
One of the suspects who confessed to the crime said this was his first attempt at kidnapping and robbery.
The eldest son of the victim said one of the suspects live in the same compound with his mother before she was kidnapped and murdered.
