The Lagos State Police Command has arrested eight police personnel for their alleged involvement in the assault and extortion of a social media influencer, Olumide Bakare.
Confirming the arrest, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Bala Elkana, said the errant cops would be subjected to the orderly room trial after the conclusion of the investigation into the matter.
He said, “The officers are with us at the provost department at the headquarter s. The Commissioner of Police, Hakeem Odumosu, has ordered that the case be transferred to the headquarters and they were all brought to the headquarters. The victim said three officers were directly involved in the incident, but eight of them were arrested because they are members of a team.
“We arrested every team member to investigate the role that each of them played. The investigation is ongoing and those involved will undergo orderly room trial and if found guilty, they will be dealt with in line with our extant laws.”
It was gathered that Bakare was assaulted and extorted on Monday by some police personnel attached to the Ogudu Police Division.
PUNCH Metro learnt that Bakare was returning from Ikeja when seven cops accosted the Taxify vehicle he was in around the Abiola Gardens area of the state.
Bakare told our correspondent that three policemen jumped into the vehicle and led him and the driver to the station.
He stated, “When we got to the station, they took us to one corner with two wooden rooms. They collected my phones, my AirPods, and my ID card.
“Even as I explained that I’m an influencer and work for several brands, they kept on searching my email, Instagram, Twitter, and WhatsApp, and after asking questions, which I gave proper answers to, they saw a text about homosexuals in a group that I belonged to and they labeled me a gay.
“The officer searching my phone alleged that I was gay and I laughed, because it was ridiculous to me and the next thing I knew was that he asked me to take off my shirt and he started beating me with a pipe. They forced me to write a statement saying I had male clients, who pay me to have casual sex with them and even listed some names for me.
“They told me to add amounts in front of the names and recorded me ‘confessing’ at gunpoint. When they saw my account balance, they demanded N1m, which I told them that I could not give; so, they reduced it to N500,000, saying that they would send the video they made to the brands I work for, post it online and lock me up for days so that I would not be able to counter it.
“After begging them, they agreed to collect N260,000 from me and called a Point of Sale operator to come to the station and the money was withdrawn from my account.”
Our correspondent learnt that the money extorted had been returned to the victim.