A 25-year-old man, Suleiman Auwal, has been caught using a stolen tricycle (keke napep) to run a transport business in Yola, Adamawa state.
Auwal was accused of stealing the tricycle last Friday at the main shopping complex in Jimeta, where it was put up for sale.
The suspect, who was without a job, then rode it to Jambutua community not more than four or five kilometres away and started using it to carry passengers.
Seller of tricycle had reported the matter to the Adamawa state police, and when they spotted the suspected thief riding the tricycle, he was apprehended.
State Police PRO, SP Suleiman Nguroje, said Auwal, who resides in a part of Jambutu called Aso Rock, confessed that he made away with the tricycle, now known to belong to one Abubakar Usman, at the Juma’at Mosque in the Jimeta Ultra Modern Market.
The police established that Auwal, who joined other people to offer the Jumat prayers at the Mosque, hurriedly completed his prayer and rushed to where tricycles were packed and stole one.
He said that in the few days that he had possession of the vehicle, he was paying N100 daily to a local security man to guard the tricycle from being stolen.
Nguroje has assured that Auwal is in police custody, and that the state Commissioner of Police, Afolabi Babatola, had ordered that the suspect be thoroughly investigated and prosecuted.
