In a distressing interview with PUNCH, Chiadoziem Ucheagwu has narrated the three-month ordeal of his family following the kidnapping of his elder brother, Jeffrey, a 30-year-old lawyer, exposing what he describes as a fruitless and exploitative response from the police.
Jeffrey was abducted along the Onitsha-Owerri Road on or around October 15, 2025. Since then, his family has been caught in a harrowing cycle of ransom payments to kidnappers and financial demands from the police, with no result.
Police Demands and a Grisly Mistaken Identity
Chiadoziem revealed that police investigators repeatedly requested money for "tracking" the kidnappers, receiving N350,000 from him. The situation reached a surreal low when officers summoned him to identify a corpse they believed was Jeffrey's.
"I fuelled their cars because, according to them, they came with about 12 cars," he stated, detailing expenses that day totalling over N240,000 for fuel alone, plus N300,000 for an ambulance and other costs. The decomposed body was unmistakably not his brother's, yet officers suggested he pay for a DNA test to confirm it.
Ransom Paid, Brother Still Missing
Alongside the police expenses, the family dealt directly with the kidnappers, who initially demanded a N10 million ransom. After negotiating down to N2 million, Chiadoziem paid the sum into a provided MoniePoint account. The payment yielded nothing—the kidnappers ceased contact, and Jeffrey remains missing.
A Plea for Action Amid Exhaustion
Expressing deep frustration, Chiadoziem lamented the police's inaction after the initial flurry of requests for money. "Since then, I haven’t got anything tangible from them," he said.
The case highlights the agonizing double jeopardy families of kidnap victims often face: extortion by criminals and perceived exploitation by the authorities tasked with helping them. Chiadoziem's account is a desperate plea for genuine investigative action to find his brother, now missing for over 90 days.
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