We don’t kill, injure our victims, we only scare them, says kidnap gang leader

BEFORE being apprehended a couple of weeks ago, Yahuza Bawa was the leader of an eight-man kidnap syndicate in Gwaram Local Government Area of Jigawa State that had been terrorising villages and Fulani settlements in the area.

However, the kidnappers’ last operation to abduct a girl for ransom led to their doom, as they were intercepted by officers of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the Jigawa State Police Command.

Speaking to Crime Reports at the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) section of the Jigawa State Police Command, the suspected gang leader, Bawa, said his group, despite its area of specialisation, did not kill or injure any of their victims while they operated.

The kidnap suspect said, “my group did not kill or harm any of our victims. In all of our operations, there was never a time we even slapped our victims; we only scared the people before abducting our targets.”

According to him: “I swear to God, we do not have any serious weapon; we only operated with a wooden object designed to look like a gun. It was Abubakar Yahaya, alias Awarbata, who carved the wood to look like a gun, while another gang member, Rabi’u, had a double-barreled gun which he was initially using for hunting, and we converted this into one of our operation tools.”

Narrating how the group was formed, Bawa said: “One night, we were all discussing the issue of kidnapping, which is prevalent in the area, and how the bandits get huge money from wealthy Fulani cattle owners. In the course of our discussion, someone suggested we could also make huge money if we took to kidnapping, and this would help ease our sufferings.

“Others agreed that we should form a gang so that we can also make some money through kidnapping, and that was how Awarbata carved the fake gun, while we also included Rabi’u’s double-barreled hunting gun.

“In our first operation, we abducted a young girl, and we were able to get N400,000 from her parents, which we shared equally. During our second operation, we got N170, 000 from the victim’s family.”

However, it was the third operation which they were planning that led to their arrest, and according to the leader of the gang, “there was a boy named Garba, who came to inform us that his father sent him to tell us to kidnap the daughter of one of their neighbours who had three cows. The plan was that after the abduction, the father of the victim would sell the cows to secure the release of his daughter.

“The group had serious debate on this operation, with some agreeing that we carry out the operation, while others were against it.

“After a couple of days, the boy came back to us that his father said he would give us N100,000 in addition to what we would make from the operation, and this encouraged us to carry out the operation.”