Two notorious kidnappers who abducted and killed a society lady, Mrs. Edith Chinedu Aliyu, have escaped from the Medium Prisons, Kuje, Abuja, in a daring jailbreak on Friday evening. This is as some prisoners rioted over the sharing of alcohol in the Kirikiri Female Prison in Lagos.

It was gathered that the two Kuje inmates, Maxwell Ajukwu and Solomon Amodu, used a plank to scale the high wall of the prisons while Muslim inmates were breaking their Ramadan fast at 7pm.

Our correspondent gathered that the two escapees were part of a gang who abducted the lady and killed her after raping her.

The daring escape set off reports that the leader of the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta, Charles Okah, had escaped from the Kuje Prisons, but the Prisons Public Relations Officer, Francis Enobore, described these as untrue.

Our correspondent gathered that one of the escaped inmates, Ajukwu, converted to Islam some weeks ago, apparently to exploit the lax security system in the prisons during the ongoing Ramadan fast.

A security source said, “The two kidnapping suspects escaped and left their colleague behind. What happened was that one of them, from the South-East, converted to Islam some weeks ago while in prison when he observed that the prison officers allowed Muslim inmates to stay late against standard prisons rules.

“Normally, the inmates are locked up in their cells by 5pm every day, but the prison authorities decided to extend the time till 8pm to enable the inmates break their fast and pray.

“Preliminary findings show that the two inmates escaped at a point near the chapel in the prisons, which was usually guarded by a prison officer, but he (the officer) did not come to work on Friday and nobody was posted to secure the place.”

Meanwhile, another source, a top prison official, who spoke with SUNDAY PUNCH on condition of anonymity, said the Kuje inmates exploited a “weakness” in the prison system.

He said, “Normally, inmates are not supposed to be outside beyond 6pm to 6.30pm daily. But the officer in charge of that prison, who takes money from the inmates, allows them stay till 9pm or 10pm.

“What happened was that some of the inmates, who had studied the lapses, decided to use them to plot their escape when it was dark. After they finished breaking their fast on Friday, they put up a ladder on the wall and jumped out. They had fled before the management noticed.”

Credit: Punch