Police inspector, 2 others arrested for impersonating EFCC operatives

Two men and a police inspector alleged to have impersonated operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and extorted unsuspecting members of the public were, on Thursday, paraded in Lagos.

The agency's zonal head in Lagos, Ghali Mohammed Ahmed, who spoke with our correspondent, said the two-man gang and the officer were nabbed at New Horizon Estate, Lekki, Lagos, on Wednesday, "in the middle of an illegal operation to 'serve' a purported court order on an unsuspecting victim."

Ahmed said: “The trio, Pascal Ugwu Chijioke, Sodiq Ibrahim Adekunle, and Edwin Bassey, the police inspector, had posed as bona fide operatives of the EFCC, and stormed the residence of their target with all the paraphernalia of typical EFCC raid-armed with security back-up, fake branded EFCC jackets and EFCC identity cards.

“They, however, ran out of luck as the commission, acting on a tip-off, swooped on them.

“Items recovered from them include the fake EFCC ID cards, the jackets, the purported court order touted to have emanated from Mushin Magistrate Court, a truck-load of household properties belonging to the unsuspecting victim.”

He said the suspects had made useful statements and would soon be arraigned in court.

A source, who does not want his name in print, said the incident occurred in the estate in which he lived, adding that “One of the fake officers tried escaping by jumping from a four-storey building but fell on the electric fence."

Ahmed urged Nigerians to be vigilant and circumspect at all times.