29yrs old James Udobong, an Akwa Ibom State
indigene, had always nursed a dream all his entire life – becoming a footballer
for Nigeria’s national team.
After training as hard as he could in 2003,
Udobong found his way to Abuja, to participate in an Under-17 trial. His hopes
were high, energy feverish, but he was dealt a soul-crushing blow.
Udobong was not picked. And so ended his hope
of ever becoming a football star.
To survive, he was repairing phones at the
popular Wuse Market but soon, he could no longer pay his shop rent, according
to claims.
According to Punch, thus started Udobong’s
journey to the criminal world of phone robbery.
He was one of many robbery, kidnapping and
fraud suspects rounded up by the Abba Kyari-led Inspector-General of Police
Response Team, recently in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, for
terrorising the residents.
Udobong said after he could no longer make
ends meet, a friend suggested that he followed him to Transcorp Hilton and
other five star hotels in Abuja, where they could target customers who were
drunk in order to steal their phones.
He said, “My friend also taught me how to
place orders online for expensive mobile phones. We tell the dealers that we
were buying the phones on behalf of a prominent politician lodged in any of the
five-star hotels we choose to use.
“When the dealer makes delivery, we take him
to a floor of the hotel and take the phones inside a door under the guise of
delivering it to the politician but the dealer wouldn’t know that door leads
through a staircase downstairs.
“Usually, after taking the phone, I jump
inside a waiting taxi in the ground floor and leave the hotel. But in my last
operation, I brought the dealer to Transcorp and asked him to wait outside the
room in order to show the phone to my principal. I got into a lift and went to
the ground floor. But I was arrested by waiting security men at the hotel.”
Udobong was handed over to the police who
recovered all the phones he stole from the dealer – iPhone, Infinix Note, two
tablets and two Samsung Galaxy phones.
Heading to prison.
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