Oyo State Police Command yesterday arrested a 72-year-old pastor, Jimi Odunayo, for allegedly defiling a 13-year-old girl in Ibadan, Oyo State.

The state police boss, CP Ngozi Onadeko, who disclosed this at the command headquarters, Eleyele, Ibadan, also paraded 47 suspects for crimes ranging from kidnapping, murder, robbery, defilement, arson and theft.

According to CP Onadeko, the pastor had been having carnal knowledge of the minor since 2019. She added that the suspect and the parents of the victims lived within the same compound and the victim always went to the living room of the suspect to watch television programmes.

Onadeko said: “On January 30, 2021, around 9.pm, one Rasaq Aishat, a 13-year-old teenage girl, confessed to her father, one Opeyemi, that one Jimi Odunayo, 72-year-old, pastor of Cherubim and Seraphim Church Oke-Aseyori, Adewale Street, Iyana Church, Montana, Ibadan, has been having unlawful carnal knowledge of her from 2019 till June 2020.

“The suspect and the parents of the victim live within the same compound and the victim always go to the living room of the suspect to watch television.

“Consequently, the suspect took advantage of the prevailing situation to have unlawful carnal knowledge of her four times.

“The suspects made a confessional statement to that effect, admitting that the allegation was true. The case has been transferred to state CID Iyaganku, Ibadan where it was charged to court on February 4, 2021.”

The police boss added that the suspect is currently remanded in a correctional centre. Among the 47 suspects paraded were four members of a dreaded syndicate and masterminds of the kidnap of the chairman of Igangan Local Government Development Area, Adeleke Olayiwola, on the Igangan/Ado-Awaye road and dispossessed him of all his personal effects and a N5.5 million ransom was paid.

Paraded also were five suspects in connection with looting and burning of the Egbeda Police Division and another one in connection with the razing of Iseyin Divisional Police headquarters. (The Guardian)

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