CP Ogun State, Lanre Bankole
Operatives of the Ogun State Police Command say they have arrested a 36-year-old man Kingsley Essien for allegedly trafficking his wife to Mali for prostitution and subsequently sold his 2- year-old son at the rate of N600,000.
Crime report from the command indicated that the suspect was arrested following the report lodged at Agbara divisional headquarters by the suspect’s wife, Bright Essien.
The state Police Public Relations Officer, Abimbola Oyeyemi said the wife reported that sometime in October 2021, her husband, Kingsley Essien, informed her that he had secured a job for her in Bamako Mali, and that he has assisted many people to that country for greener pastures before.
Oyeyemi added that she explained further that the suspect being her husband, she didn’t suspect any foul play until she got to Mali and discovered that she has been sold to human trafficker cartel headed by a woman at the rate of One million four hundred thousand naira(N1,400,000).
The state police spokesman said that the victim said while in Mali, she was forced into prostitution, but later find her way to Nigeria embassy in Bamako where she was assisted back to Nigeria.
Oyeyemi said further, “On getting to Nigeria, she discovered that her two-year- old son in care of her husband is nowhere to be found.”
Acting on the report, the Divisional Police Officer, Agbara, SP Abiodun Salau detailed detectives to go after the suspect, and he was eventually arrested.
He said during interrogation, the suspect confessed to the commission of the crime, and owned up that he sold the two- year- old son to somebody at the rate of six hundred thousand naira(N600,000).
Meanwhile, the state Commissioner of Police, Lanre Bankole, has ordered the transfer of the suspect to the Anti- human Trafficking and Child Labour Unit of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department for discreet investigation.
He equally ordered that the buyer of the son must be traced and arrested in order to recover the stolen child.
