Bukoladeremi Ladigbolu/
After weeks of investigations, Newsmakers has finally located the Ghana mansions of billionaire kidnapper, Chukwudumeme Onwuamadike aka Evans, as Nigeria Police awaits legal authority to seize his assets.
Newsmakers also found that Evans has put the future of his children in jeopardy by stopping their education, as he quickly withdrew them from the Supreme Education Foundation Schools, at 23, Emmanuel Keshi Road, in Magodo GRA, and moved them to Ghana, when he suspected that the police were closing in on him, a month before his arrest in June.
With the support of some of his workers, Newsmakers traced Evans mansions to Accra, the capital of Ghana.
Evans wife and five children live in his one-storey duplex on Spintex Road, a major highway in Eastern Accra. The Ghana mansions are similar to the ones found in Magodo, Lagos. The one where his family lives has the same turquoise-blue colour as the one where Evans was living in Magodo.
Through further assistance from the children’s school in Magodo, Newsmakers also learnt that Evans was paying N3million as fees per term.
According to Newsmakers’ sources, his first child, a girl in Primary Six, is known as Chioma. The youngest child, a boy, was in pre-school. Their surname in school was Chinwuba and they are prominent in the school’s year album.
Evans allegedly withdrew the kids in May without notifying the school known as the best in Magodo.
Meanwhile, the police spokesman in Nigeria told Newsmakers yesterday that the authorities were yet to secure a forfeiture order on the assets they have so far traced to Evans.
In a telephone chat with Newsmakers, Force Public Relations Officer, CSP Moshood Jimoh said that the police were yet to secure a legal authority to seize Evans’ assets.
According to him, only a competent court of law can give such an order, after the police must have filed an application before it to that effect.
He added that the police were waiting to conclude ongoing investigations into Evans’ activities, with a view to unearthing all his other assets and arresting all his accomplices, before approaching the courts for a forfeiture order on his known assets.
Jimoh also told Newsmakers that all the police were doing was to secure the assets already uncovered to ensure that they were not dissipated before investigation is concluded.
He said, “You know police have no right to seize anyone’s property, more so when they have not been convicted of any crime. It is only the courts that can make such an order once the police can establish the assets in question were acquired with proceeds from crime. What we are doing now is to secure the assets to ensure they are not stripped or depleted. Once we conclude investigations, we will charge all the suspects to court and request that their assets be forfeited to the government.”
When asked what the police were doing to secure his assets in Ghana and prevent them from being tampered with, Jimoh declined to answer the question. He said that it would be counterproductive to disclose all aspects of their investigations to the public.
Newsmakers had, however, earlier reported that the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Idris, sought the help of his Ghanaian counterpart in keeping a close eye on Evans’ immediate family to ensure they do not jeopardize ongoing investigations into his reign of terror.
Idris had made the appeal at the West Africa National Security Conference, in Ghana, on June 21, where he also revealed that Evans had successfully obtained Ghanaian international passports for himself, wife and two of their five children using false names.
Idris said at the forum it was necessary for Ghana’s security agencies to closely monitor the wife and other family members of the suspect to ensure that a comprehensive investigation was carried out and other accomplices were brought to book.
Evans, who has been linked with a number of high profile kidnappings, confessed to collecting ransoms in foreign currencies running into millions.
He is known to own two mansions in the highbrow Magodo Estate, Shangisha, Lagos, with a combined value of about N250 million. He was arrested, by members of the IGP’s Intelligence Response Team (IRT) led by ACP Abba Kyari, in one of his Lagos mansions, on June 10.
Sources close to Evans had disclosed exclusively to Newsmakers in June that he renovated the house on Fred Shoboyede Road, Magodo and fitted it with state of the art furniture and painted floors, at an estimated cost of N500million, soon after he bought the property in March 2016 at N120million.
The sources also disclosed that the interior of his mansion was painted with a special decorative paint known as 3D, while the television in his guest sitting room was valued at N13million, when converted from dollars then. They said he also bought the two armchairs in his guest waiting room for N1.8 million.
The police had found that Evans also acquired several vehicles and kept an undisclosed amount of money in some commercial banks.
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Shame on Evans and his accomplices spending blood money. They shall all experience the wrath of God.
You claimed to have spent close to 10 years trying to unmask Evans, that simply means you’ve probably got enough in the last 10 years for prosecution and conviction . Even now, some of his victims are alive and willing to testify, so why is he yet to be charged to court? A rich criminal like him would certainly have godfathers who might be working behind the scenes for the noise to die down before quietly letting him off the hook. Justice delayed is without doubt justice denied.