A suspect, Ayomide Adeleye, a 200-level Philosophy student of the Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU), Ogun State, has confessed to killing Christianah Idowu, a 300-level student of the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB).
His confession, made to the 174 Battalion of the Nigerian Army, brought an end to the two-week-long search for the slain victim.
The Nation learnt the matter has been transferred to the Lagos Police Command for further investigation.
Christiana had left her home in the Itaoluwo area of Ikorodu heading to the University of Lagos in the Yaba area of the state where she was observing her industrial training before, she was abducted by the kidnappers.
The abductors reached out to the family through her telephone, demanding that a ransom of N3m be paid before she could be released.
After several appeals from the family, the abductors agreed that a sum of N350,000 be paid to a certain account, which the family paid, but the abductors refused to release her despite the payment.
Combined security efforts unravelled the whole mystery. Troops tracked Idowu’s phone to Adeleye’s residence in the Ikorodu area of Lagos State. He confessed to security agencies that he killed the victim and buried her in their house.
The hashtag – #JusticeForChristiana is one of the top trends on Nigeria’s X (formerly Twitter), with over 100,000 posts as of the time of filing this report.
His gory action drew the ire of many Nigerians on social media. Outraged by the incident, many Nigerians on Twitter, demanded justice for the victim, asking relevant stakeholders to ensure justice is served.
The Nation learnt that intelligence operatives were able to uncover the location of the abductor through the BVN and account details used in collecting ransom from the family.
Upon his arrest, the military found seven phones in Adeleye’s possession. They also found an email address he created to receive a statement of account confirming ransom payment.
To apprehend him, the military obtained a SportyBet account he provided to Idowu’s mother; 9336380839 (Wema Bank), and froze the account after she paid N350,000 into it on August 21.
After experiencing issues accessing the account, Adeleye demanded a statement of account be sent to him via the email address; musaahmed0288@gmail.com.
The email address he created was a combination of two names; Musa and Ahmed, to match the persona he had donned to execute the con.
On Sunday, September 1, the 174 Battalion tracked Idowu’s phone to Adeleye’s residence where they picked him up. He confessed to burying her in a shallow grave in his compound. During interrogation, Adeleye attempted to commit suicide but was restrained.
