Hunger forced me into crime - 14-yr-old suspect

Ateenager arrested for allegedly breaking into a shop at Jakande Estate, Ejigbo, where he stole a laptop has said that hunger forced him into crime.

The 14-year-old suspect who was arrested along with another 13-yearold boy after they sold the laptop for N2,000 said he was left by his father to sleep in a shop after his step-mother drove him out of the house.

He said he was forced sleeping inside his father’s shop since he was 12.

He said: “I don’t even to start tailoring know my biological mother. My father has refused to tell me who my mother is. I don’t know if she is dead or alive. I was staying with my father and my stepmother until two years ago when she told my father to look for someone for me to stay with.

“That fateful day I stole N200 from my step-mother to buy food because I was hungry. She drove me out of the house when she got to know of it. Since then I have been sleeping in my father’s shop.”

On why he was arrested, he said he had entered a shop where he stole a laptop.

“I showed it to a friend of mine who followed me to where I sold it. The uncle who bought it gave me N2,000 with the promise that he was going to give me another N1,000. I never knew that someone saw me when I entered the shop. It was the man who reported me to the owner and I was arrested,” he said.

The Lagos State police boss, Imohimi Edgal, said the command’s operatives attached to Ejigbo Police Divisional Headquarters arrested the two teenagers.

Egdal said the duo specialized in breaking into people’s shops at the dead of night, but that luck ran out on them when they burgled a shop located at Block 397, Jakande Estate, Ejigbo and made away with one generator valued N15,000; one HP Laptop valued at N90,000; one amplifier valued N40,000; and one CD mixer valued N150,000.

He further said that police detectives were able to arrest their adult collaborators who identified themselves as Adejagun Babatunde, 27 and Lawal Wasiu, 20.

He said Babatunde admitted to have bought the stolen HP laptop for the sum of N2000.

He said the adult suspects would have their days in court while the child offenders would be handed over to the gender section for appropriate action.