A Police Inspector and two armed robbers were killed on Thursday during a bank robbery at Abaji Area Council of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja.
Consequently, some angry residents of Abaji set the corpse of one of armed robbers ablaze.
Information gathered from a police officer revealed that a group of robbers invaded a bank in Abaji town around 5:30pm.
He said that the robbers first attacked a police station along Toto Road where a Police Inspector simply identified as Abila was shot dead.
According to the police officer, the robbers, who alighted from two unmarked vehicles, started firing sporadically into the police station.
“It is God who saved me because when the robbers alighted from the vehicles, they started shooting into the police station.
“While I managed to escape, an Inspector who had earlier escaped later turned back because they had shot him in the chest,” he said.
Our reporter learnt that some members of the gang proceeded to the First Bank branch located at the roundabout side and started shooting sporadically.
One of the staff of the bank, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the robbers could not succeed in accessing the strong room of the bank where the bulk monies were kept but made away with some cash at the counter.
He said the robbers first shot a guard who ran into the toilet of the bank’s security house before they walked into the bank.
It was also gathered that a combined team of policemen, soldiers, vigilantes and hunters quickly mobilised to the scene and engaged the robbers in a fierce gun battle, which led to the killing of two of the criminals.
An angry mob later seized one of the corpses and set it ablaze.
Meanwhile, the FCT Police Commissioner, CP Benneth Igweh, who later arrived at the scene in company of police officers, confirmed that two of the robbers were shot dead during an exchange of gunfire with security operatives.
CP Igwe, who commiserated with the family of the deceased Police Inspector, said Police Anti-Robbery Squad and hunters had been deployed in the bush to trace the fleeing robbers, even as he commended the effort of the combined team of security agents for foiling the attack.
