A 47-year-old wife of a retired naval officer, Mrs Ebi Agori, has narrated the ordeal she went through in the hands of personnel of the Inspector-General of Police Monitoring Unit, who allegedly shot and killed her 21-year-old son, Daniel Agori.
Ebi, an evangelist, alleged that officials of the IGP Monitoring Unit, had arrested her, her two sons – Daniel and David – and a family friend at 4, Nyege Close, Gbei Road in Nkpolu, Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of Rivers State, where the family resides.
She said the policemen stormed their house around 10am on May 11, 2019 and took them away.
She alleged that one of the policemen shot David in the leg and forced the nozzle of a gun into her private parts, which made her to bleed.
She explained that the security personnel raided their residence on the invitation of her first daughter, Blessing, who she described as dating one of the policemen.
She said her daughter had threatened to deal with her and other members of the family over “a minor issue”.
Ebi stated that she never knew that her daughter was serious about carrying out the threat, adding that Daniel was tortured to death in police custody.
She said, “My daughter is Victor’s lover, who is a police officer with the IGP Monitoring Unit. Blessing refused to prepare some fish that we were to eat and this caused a fight. She then threatened to kill us. She invited the policemen. They came in two vehicles and shot into the air. One of the bullets bruised David’s lap.
“They used a pestle to hit me and Daniel’s girlfriend. They broke all our louvres and took away N200,000 cash from our house. While they were taking us to their base in Aluu, they collected N3,000 from Daniel, and used it to buy fuel. Two of them forced my legs open, and inserted the nozzle of the gun into my private parts. I was bleeding even while I was in their office, there was blood everywhere.”
The woman said on getting to their office in Aluu, the policemen beat Daniel with a pestle and shot him in her presence, adding that the police cooked up a lie that Daniel was a kidnapper and robber.
“The Commander of the IGP Monitoring Unit later confirmed to me that my son is dead. My late son was a footballer and was into hairstyling. They claimed they found a gun in one of the rooms. But I never believed that. They are only saying that after killing him. The police lied against my son after killing him. If there was anything they heard about him, they did not investigate it,” she added.
She called on the IGP, Mohammed Adamu, and well-meaning Nigerians to help her get justice over the extrajudicial killing of her son and the ordeal she went through.
Efforts by our correspondent to get Blessing’s side of the story proved abortive. When our correspondent contacted her, she disconnected the line after he introduced himself to her and did not pick up subsequent calls to her line.
A lawyer to the Agoris, Ndubuisi Wuwa, said the matter had been reported to the Federation of International Women Lawyers and the state Commissioner of Police, Usman Belel.
He said, “We are preparing to file a case of infringement on the rights of our clients against the IGP, the IGP Monitoring Unit Commander in Aluu, DSP Bello Yusuf, and Victor Ne, Blessing Agori’s boyfriend and a member of the IGP Monitoring Unit in Aluu.
“A suspect is presumed innocent until a court proves otherwise. The suspect was arrested and there was no gun battle. They did not find any gun with him and yet, they claimed they found a gun with him.”
However, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Nnamdi Omoni, said Daniel was a self-confessed armed robber and a kidnapper.
He said, “The matter is before the Commissioner of Police. I called the IGP Unit Commander and he told me that the boy that was killed was a self-confessed armed robber and a kidnapper, who had confessed to several kidnapping incidents he was involved in.
“The father of the boy said in the presence of the mother that his son was a bad boy and that he always brought different kind of arms home.”
