A community based security outfit, Ahoada Security Planning Advisory Committee (ASPAC), in Ahoada East local government area of Rivers State, has allegedly killed three persons involved in the mobbing a witch doctor in the area.
It was gathered that the native doctor who was caught burying a three-month-old baby at midnight in Edeoha community in the area, suddenly disappeared when angry youths attempted to mob him.
The youths who attempted to burn down his shrine but couldn’t succeeded in raiding the house .
Inside the house were peoples’ photographs chained to chairs and other fetish items, prominent among which was the picture of a serving commissioner in Rivers State, Emeka Onowu.
An eyewitness, who gave her name simply as Bidemi, disclosed that following a tip-off, the local vigilante members arrived at the scene and started shooting sporadically with claims that the suspect was in charge of preparing their amulets.
The witness alleged that when the vigilantes came there, they got angry and killed three people on the claim that he was the one who did charms for them.
The witness explained that the witch doctor, popularly known as Dr. Indian, was caught burying a three-month-old baby on Monday night by a supposedly drunk man returning to his house in the wee hours, which drew attention of the villagers.
She narrated that after the angry mob had destroyed the witch doctor’s house and shrine, where some pictures and other diabolic stuff were seen chained together, he disappeared on their way to the police station.
She said: “I witnessed the shooting. The witch doctor simply known as Dr. Mike Indian hails from Delta State but resident in the said community.
“A boy said he saw the man chanting and doing some incantations about a baby he had buried. The boy, who was under the influence of alcohol, went into the shrine and dragged him out. This happened around 1:00a.m. So, this morning, the whole village crowded round his house.
“When I got there, I saw more than one hundred pictures, different numbers of people’s pictures, there was a particular chain that had different sizes of padlocks, all locked. There was another section that had a woman’s stool with a binding chain and another side had different pictures all chained together. After the boy’s revelation, they dug up the dead three-month-old baby, which the doctor used to do the sacrifice this morning.
“I heard he was confessing but at a point, he disappeared. I don’t know the mother of the baby, maybe he got the baby from somewhere far away because nobody has come to lay claims to the dead baby.”
State Police Public Relations Officer, SP Nnamdi Omoni confirmed the development.
