The Commissioner of Police in Edo State, Monday Agbonika, on Wednesday, said no fewer than 95 suspected cultists have been arrested and charged to court in the past month.
This is, as he said, 25 firearms, including two AK-47 rifles, 130 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition, 135 live cartridges, and four stolen/robbed vehicles were recovered within the period.
He listed other items recovered to include a Lar Mark rifle, three English pistols, one Beretta pistol, four single barrel guns, cash and an iphone 16 plus.
Agbonika stated this at a press briefing to mark his one month as CP in the state.
The event saw the Edo CP disclose that it has rescued seven kidnap victims, while 12 suspected kidnappers have confessed to a new mode of operation.
He said the new mode adopted by kidnappers is to use their victims as shields when they are being chased by operatives.
“Our operations are not easy. Whenever kidnappers take hostages and we go after them like we are going after them now, when we come across these kidnappers, we find it difficult to fire at them because they use their hostages as human shields, and they are at liberty to fire at us.
We are working on introducing other technological assistance in tracking these kidnappers and making it easy to pick them out without hurting the victims. We want to be proactive to ensure that kidnapping does not take place,” Agbonika said.
He, however, pledged to sustain engagement with communities, bush combing operations across area commands and divisions, intelligence-led raids of flashpoints and high visibility policing to stem criminality in the state.
He added that the police were working with the state government to reform the vigilante.
This, he noted would ensure that vigilante serve only in their communities and guarantee that forests were well guarded.
