The Rivers State Police Command has confirmed the arrest of six officers captured in a viral video assaulting a young man on the outskirts of Port Harcourt, the state capital.
The Command’s spokesperson, Grace Iringe-Koko, revealed the development on Thursday during a conversation with our correspondent.
In the trending footage, the victim appeared drenched in blood streaming from a head injury that stained his face and clothes.
Narrating his ordeal, the man alleged that the policemen stopped his vehicle, demanding a tinted glass permit. He explained that although he had attempted to renew the permit, he was delayed by technical challenges at the issuing agency.
He further recounted that the officers ignored his explanation, branding him and his brother criminals, manhandling them, and even physically assaulting the young woman who accompanied them. According to him, one of the officers eventually struck his head with a hard object.
“The officers insisted on taking my car to the station, accusing us of being criminals. They also brutalised the lady with us and even stripped her,” he said.
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He alleged that the policemen demanded ₦1 million for his release, threatening to detain him over the tinted permit issue. “I told them I couldn’t afford that. I offered ₦20,000 because when I went to the Internal Revenue Service, they told me their system was down,” he explained.
According to him, his brother was slapped until he collapsed, while he himself was beaten, leaving him with a head wound.
Meanwhile, Iringe-Koko confirmed that the arrested policemen were being held in custody and would face an orderly room trial.
She added that both the victim and the accused officers appeared before the Commissioner of Police, Olatunji Rilwan Olugbenga Adepoju, who ordered a full-scale probe by the command’s monitoring team.
“The six officers and the complainant were heard by the CP. He immediately directed that the officers be detained and subjected to trial. He also instructed his monitoring unit to thoroughly investigate the case,” the spokesperson stated.
