RAPID Response Squad (RRS) operatives have arrested a suspected phone thief, allegedly captured on a Close Circuit Television (CCTV) footage now circulating on social media.
Timilehin Olaniyi allegedly told the RRS that he stole the iPhone 8s in his desperation to pay his N80,000 school fee.
Olaniyi, a 200-level student of D. S. Adegbenro Information Communication Technology (ICT) College in Wasimi, Ogun State, claimed that he came to the Computer Village in Ikeja on February 16 to sell an iPhone 5s given to him by his course mate to enable him raise money for his school fee.
A RRS statement yesterday claimed that he stole the iphone 8s while there. Olaniyi was arrested on Thursday.
The suspect was tracked and arrested in Wasimi, Ogun State by the RRS Decoy Team.
The RRS quoted Olaniyi as saying : “I was in Lagos on the invitation of a close friend. He is aware that I was struggling to pay my school fees, so he gave me an iphone 5s to sell in order to raise money.
“So I went to Computer Village to sell the phone. When I entered the phone store, my plan was to know the price of Iphone 7s but it was not available. I noticed that one of the attendants went out leaving behind an Iphone 8s on the table. I don’t know what came over me. I monitored the other attendant and I went away with the phone. I never knew I was captured by the CCTV. I sold that iphone 5s to pay my tuition fee while I started using the iphone 8s.
“It was about the second day that the friend I was squatting with sent me packing from his house over a CCTV footage circulating on the internet of a phone thief. He said I was the one.”
Olaniyi, it was learnt, failed to open up to his elder brother who saw him sporting a T-shirt he bought for him in the video.
The brother had gone to hire a lawyer over the case before the suspect confessed and was arrested few days later.
