5 Fake Businessmen Arrested for Allegedly Abducting and Gang-raping a customer they met via Instagram

The Suspects

The Lagos state Police Command has arrested 5 suspects for allegedly abducting and gang-raping a woman.

According to PUNCH, the suspects – Ugochukwu Eso, Gabriel Obinna, Chinedu Ezechukwu, Akubueze Nnadozie and Godwin Balogun – used a hotel in the Agege area of the state to perpetrate the crime.

One of the suspects, Obinna had been communicating with the victim as a lady named Vanessa, after they both met on Instagram. Vanessa told the victim that she was a graduate and sold clothes.

The victim said she and Vanessa had been communicating on the telephone before the incident. Obinna (Vanessa) said he used a Magic Voice Application on his phone to feign a lady’s voice while talking to the victim.

According to the victim, Vanessa had invited her to inspect some goods at her apartment (the hotel). When the victim arrived, the suspects allegedly gang-raped her and collected N50,000 from her before releasing her.

The victim reported the matter at the Isokoko Police Division and the Lagos State Domestic and Sexual Violence Response Team (DSVRT), Alausa, after leaving the hotel.

The police arrested the suspects at the hotel.

The DSVRT Coordinator, Lola-Vivour Adeniyi, said:

One of the suspects, named Vanessa, chatted with the victim on Instagram. She claimed that she was a graduate and she sold clothes. According to the victim, the fake businesswoman called her from time to time to discuss business with her.

On the day of the incident, the victim came from Oshodi to the address Vanessa gave her in Agege. As she climbed into the house, reportedly owned by Vanessa, three men pushed her into a room and increased the volume of the television so that no one would hear her voice.

After the rape, the suspects said she should provide N2m before she would be released. She called some friends and was able to raise N50,000, which they withdrew from her bank account using the ATM. She was held hostage from 12pm to 7pm.

The DSVRT has directed her to the Mirabel Centre, Ikeja, for a checkup. We worked with the police to ensure the arrest of the suspects and the victim has identified three of them.

Narrating their own side of the story, one of the suspects, Eso said:

The lady came into the hotel to meet another woman. When she saw us, she became nervous. We calmed her down and told her we were just looking for money to eat and she should give us whatever she had.

She gave us N20,000 and we began to talk freely in the room. She used some drugs and willingly had sexual affair with me and Gabriel (Obinna). After the sex, we accompanied her to the taxi and we parted amicably. It was not a rape.

According to Obinna: “The lady and I had been discussing on the phone; we were friends. I have a Magic Voice application on my phone which I used to discuss with her. We did not rape her. She did not make any noise during the sex; she was just smiling. We were the ones who put her on a bus. Only two of us slept with her”.

A police source told PUNCH that the gang’s mode of operation was to lure female customers into their midst, gang-rape them and threaten to blackmail them with video recordings of the rape unless some money was paid to them.

Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni, who paraded the suspects said they would be charged to court after investigation is complete.