psychiatric patient beaten and almost lynched for kidnapping in Akure

The timely intervention of detectives from Ondo State Police Command reportedly saved a 25-year-old psychiatric patient from being set ablaze for allegedly attempting to kidnap some primary school pupils in Ondo town, yesterday. Some youths in Oka area of the town were about roasting him alive, when policemen arrived the scene. Vanguard gathered that ýthe suspect, identified as Peter Oyeyemi, was accused of lurking around the school when youths saw him and kept a tab on him. He was alleged to have lured some pupils only to be challenged by the youths, who searched him. During the search, items discovered in his bags include passport-sized photographs of different persons, picture of a teenage girl, a tecno handset, cash, female dresses and a copy of Bible and Quran. The youths raised an alarm that he was a kidnapper and more youths mobilised to the scene. They stripped him naked and while some of the youths went for a tyre, others made for petrol. He was reportedly beaten to pulp before those who went for used tyre and petrol ýreturned. Vanguard learned that some elders in the area informed the police who raced to the scene and whisked him away. Police’s reaction The command’s spokesman, Wole Ogodo, who confirmed the incident, however, said the suspect was a psychiatric patient who escaped from a mental home in the state capital. According to him, police detectives discovered during interrogation that he was not mentally balanced. Ogodo said his parents had been contacted and that they confirmed that he escaped from the psychiatric hospital in Akure, where he was receiving treatment. He said: “The suspect was mistaken for a kidnapper. He is not. He is a psychiatric patient and his parents have gone to the station to show the police the documents of his health status.” He, however, appealed to the people of the state not to take laws into their hands, advising that suspected criminals should be reported to the police. The spokesman, who noted that but for the timely intervention of policemen the suspect would have been roasted alive on an allegation that was not proven, warned that jungle justice would not be tolerated in the state.