Worried by the frequent stealing of phones and other items in the church, members of the ‘Favorite House Church,’ located at the Lekki area of Lagos State, decided to set a trap to catch the thief.
The trap nailed 30-year-old Tunde Aro.
Unaware that the church members had a secret meeting, where it was decided they should plant a dummy phone, to catch the thief, Aro had as usual, sailed into the church, pretending to be pious like other worshipper.
But within a twinkling of an eye, he had stealthily stolen a Samsung Galaxy phone. He was however unaware that it was a dummy.
The suspect had however denied being the sought after thief. He claimed that he was just a victim of circumstance. According to him, he had taken the dummy phone, with a plan to hand it over to the church usher. He said he was shocked when they accused him of being a thief.
A police source said: “The church members told us that several things had mysteriously been disappearing from the church. They recorded missing laptops, phones and other valuable items.”
The source continued: “The attentions of the security guards in the church were always drawn to these missing items. They became worried as it continued, but they did not want to accuse anybody, in order not to cause bad blood. The security team of the Church decided to plant the dummy phone while they watch.
“Aro was said to have picked the phone and on his way outside the premises, he was caught and handed over to the police.”
Preliminary investigations carried by the police at Lekki, revealed that Aro had been to prison in the past for criminal offences, prompting his transfer to the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), Ikeja, Lagos State command for further investigation.
According to the suspect, he used to work with Hotel De Island in Lekki, before he quit.
He said: “I left the hotel because of a problem. It bothers on salary problem and some missing stocks. I was arrested because I picked phone in the Church after closing from the Church. They said I’m a thief. The usher said a lot of things have been missing in the church. I wanted to hand it over to the usher before I was arrested.” But police insisted that Aro was had already walked out of the church premises before he was stopped.
He argued: “The phone was outside the church. It was in the premises. I had not gone far with. I wanted to go to the gate before they caught me in the front of the church.”
He insisted that he had never stolen anything in that before, especially since he was a church member.
“I am a member of the church. I don’t know the name of the church because it was not too long I was invited to that church. I attended the church twice before I had accident and stopped. It was one of my neighbours who invited me to the church.”
Asked what led to his going to prisons before, Aro said: “It was because of a problem in my place of work. Some stock of drinks got missing in the Hotel. They were about four expensive drinks; I was not the only person arrested. The incident happened in December, 2014.”
He explained that they were four staff on duty, on the day the bottles of wine disappeared and the management had arrested all of them.
They were all charged to court.
“But before then, they said if we can pay for the missing drinks, we would not be charged,” recalled Aro. “But we could not, so they took us to court. We were remanded for about a month in Ikoyi Prison before my brother came to bail me.”
He said that a bottle of the missing wine goes for as much as N25, 000 and N30, 000 in the hotel.
The matter was later struck out because the complainants were no longer coming to court, said Aro.
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