The Bayelsa state Police command has arrested an 18-year-old housewife, Divine Preye Idan and her 35-year-old husband, Idan, after they allegedly robbed a boutique in Biogbolo-Epie, Yenagoa Local Government Area of the state.

The Commissioner of Police, Amba Asuquo, said the couple stole clothes and cash at gunpoint but were apprehended in an attempt to escape from the scene.

Divine confessed that they hired the locally-made gun they used during the operation from another couple, Iro Royereyigha, 30, and Abani Perelebina, 18.

She said when she hatched the robbery plan alongside her husband, they had wanted to use a toy gun in executing their plot, but changed their mind after Iro and his wife, they said they could get them a rifle.
The mother of one, who is also pregnant, said after negotiating for the gun with an initial deposit of N1000, they proceeded for the operation.

She said:

“Both of us went for the robbery. We went to the house of Iro and Ida to get a toy gun to threaten people for money. But Iro said he had no toy gun but promised to get a rifle one for us.
“He told us he could get a locally-made gun popularly called Awka gun. He said we should give him money. But we told him that what we had was only N1000. He said we should drop the N1000 but that we should pay N100,000 after the operation.
“We agreed and I gave his wife, N1000. But when my husband went to collect the gun, I couldn’t go with him. I only went with him for the robbery”.

Divine, who hails from Kalabari in Rivers State, said she and her husband, an indigene of Odi, in Kolokuma-Opokuma Local Government Area, mapped out a strategy to steal from the boutique.

She said:

“We had an arrangement. The plan was that on entering the boutique, I would pose as if I came to buy some clothes. After collecting the items, I would do as if I had money to pay while my husband would threaten them with a gun.
“Everything was going as planned when my husband asked me to go and get tricycle to convey us and our stolen items out of the place. As I left, one of the girls, who lay flat on the ground ran away and called for help”.

Divine’s husband, Idan, corroborated his wife’s account of their criminal act, but said it was their first time of engaging in robbery.

He said they were dealing on timber adding that hardship drove them into robbery. He appealed to the police to forgive them.

On his part, Iro, who hired the gun, said temptation led him to commit the crime and to involve his wife in the criminal act.

Iro, a father of 11 children from two women said he got the gun from a friend and handed it over to his second wife, who subsequently gave it to Divine’s husband.

“I am a reasonable man. I don’t know what drove me into this crime. I have been earning a decent living as an auto mechanic before now”, he said.

Parading the couples, CP Asuquo, said they would be charged to court after investigations and lamented rising parental irresponsibility in Bayelsa.