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Robbers kill three policemen in bullion van attack

Posted by By Emmanuel Obe, Benin on 2008/02/09 | Views: 582 |

Robbers kill three policemen in bullion van attack


Three policemen were shot dead while five others sustained serious injuries on Friday at Ugoneki, Edo State when robbers attacked a bullion van conveying N125 million from the Nkpro, Anambra State branch of Zenith Bank to another branch in Benin City.

Three policemen were shot dead while five others sustained serious injuries on Friday at Ugoneki, Edo State when robbers attacked a bullion van conveying N125 million from the Nkpro, Anambra State branch of Zenith Bank to another branch in Benin City.

Our correspondent gathered that the 10 robbers, who were heavily armed with sub-machine guns, attacked the bullion van and its escorts around 10am. However, policemen were swiftly drafted from the State Anti-Robbery Squad in Benin City and they stopped the robbers from carting away the money.

The robbers were said to have trailed the bullion van in two vehicles, an Audi and a Toyota Corolla from Anambra State to Ugoneki where they struck. Police sources said the gang which lost some of its members in the encounter, escaped with their dead colleagues in the Audi and abandoned the Toyota Corolla. The Edo State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Chris Dega, later told reporters in Benin that the command received a call from an official of Zenith Bank to the effect that armed robbers had intercepted their van conveying money from a branch in Nkpor to Benin City. He said, 'I quickly informed my people and we dispatched SARS immediately to the area. I am happy to announce that at the end of the day, we were able to recover the van with the whole money. The money was eventually counted by the officials of the bank and the N125 million was complete. But on a sad note, we lost three mobile policemen in the encounter. The mobile policemen were those escorting the money from Nkpor to Benin.

'Also, some of the mobile policemen sustained injuries and they are presently receiving treatment in the hospital. Though the robbers also had their casualties, they escaped with them in one of the vehicles. They were well armed with sophisticated weapons. They had large numbers of magazines that were fully loaded. We recovered some of them fully loaded with 29 rounds of ammunition."

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