Photo: NSCDC Arrests Men Caught with Corpse of 3-year-old Girl

The Abia State’s command of the Nigeria
Security and Civil Defence Corps has arrested
two men, Chibuike Anibuife and Jonathan
Nwogu, allegedly caught with a dead baby girl
in a sack.
Punch reports that the state’s Commandant, Mr.
Andy Dateer, said they were arrested by NSCDC
men on patrol at Ariaria Junction, Osisioma near
Aba. The suspects were intially intercepted by
some residents who wanted to lynch them after
the discovery of the corpse of the little girl, but
the NSCDC whisked the suspects away to
prevent them from being lynched by the mob.
According to Mr. Andy:
“The people were attracted to the suspects
following a sharp argument between them
and another man. The man, however, escaped
when he sensed that the residents had become
suspicious of them. The mob was infuriated by
the strange content of the sack and demanded
explanations from the men, but their failure to
provide satisfactory answer made the mob
descend on them.
They will be handed over to the police for
proper investigation. The NSCDC men only
rescued the suspects from the angry mob so
that the truth of their mission could be
unravelled.”
The Punch correspondent, however, learnt from
an NSCDC source that the suspects insisted that
they were contacted by the father of the
deceased child to help him bury the corpse.
According to the source, who pleaded
anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to
PUNCH Metro on the incident, the suspects later
took NSCDC operatives to a hospital in Aba
where the corpse was allegedly given to them
to bury.
The source said a nurse at the hospital admitted
that the girl died while receiving treatment. It
was learnt that the request by the security
agents to see the doctor in charge was turned
down and the NSCDC operatives tactfully
withdrew from the hospital without arresting the
nurse or the doctor for fear of being attacked.
Anibuife, however, denied any involvement in
the death of the baby, saying he never knew the
other suspect, but had only intervened when the
crowd wanted to lynch him. But Nwogu said a
man had approached him and begged him to
help him bury his deceased child in a site
where he was working.
He said the man paid him N2,000 and later
drove him to the hospital where they took the
corpse for burial. He denied being a ritual killer
or kidnapper, adding that he only accepted to
bury the corpse because he was looking for
money.