Two medicine vendors, Habu Badiru and Auwal Lawan, have confessed to injecting and strangling a commercial tricycle rider, Algoni Goni, in Adamawa State.
Badiru, 27, and Lawan, 26, stated that they injected Goni with an overdose of pentazocine, more commonly referred to as pento, in order to steal his new tricycle.
Pentazocine can slow or stop breathing. Misuse of the drug can cause addiction, overdose or death.
Confessing to the killing of the tricycle operator, the duo said they boarded the tricycle to Badiru’s house, where they forcefully held the rider and injected him with pento before dumping his corpse by the riverbank in Uba, in the Hong Local Government Area of the state.
Narrating how they got caught by the police, Badiru said, “After killing Goni, I rode the tricycle to Mubi to sell it, but people refused to buy it due to lack of particulars. I then parked the tricycle at Mararaba Mubi.
“The following morning, I took the tricycle to Mubi for the second time to sell. I decided to call a buyer from Uba. But when he arrived, he asked me how I got the tricycle since he knew me to be a patent store operator.
“The man who came to buy the tricycle called the chairman of the tricycle riders association and informed him without me knowing it. The chairman and the prospective buyer were accompanied by a policeman, who told me I was under arrest.”
Lawan, while speaking on his role in the murder, recalled that on March 4, 2022, he got a call from Badiru, who sought his assistance with a plan to kill the tricycle operator so he could raise N100,000 to settle a debt.
He claimed that he only helped his friend to administer the injection, while Badiru strangled the victim.
The state Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Suleiman Nguroje, assured that the suspects would be charged to court at the end of investigations.