The Ogun State Police Command has arrested a 23-year-old mother, said to be a call girl, Mary Olatayo, for allegedly selling her three weeks old baby for N600,000.
The command’s Police Public Relations Officer, Abimbola Oyeyemi, disclosed this in a statement on Thursday.
Oyeyemi said the suspect was arrested following a complaint from the father of the baby.
The PPRO said the father reported the matter at Mowe divisional headquarters, narrating that, he met Mary Olatayo sometime ago and they started dating each other which led to pregnancy and the baby in question.
The man disclosed that when Mary got pregnant, he rented an apartment for her where she lived till she gave birth to a baby boy.
According to him, Olatayo suddenly disappeared with the baby from the rented apartment three weeks after delivery.
She was said to have relocated to a hotel, where she had gone for a ‘hook up’ with another man.
“He complained further that the lady suddenly disappeared with the baby from the apartment three weeks after delivery only for her to be found in a hotel where she has gone for a hookup with another man.
“All efforts to know where the baby is proved futile”, Ogun police spokesman, Abimbola Oyeyemi, quoted the man as saying.
Oyeyemi informed that the DPO of Mowe Division, SP Folake Afeniforo, acting on the report, detailed detectives to the scene, and the suspect was arrested.
While being interrogated, Oyeyemi said Olatayo “confessed to the police that she has sold the baby to someone in Anambra State at the rate of six hundred thousand Naira. She confessed that it was her friend, Chioma Esther Ogbonna, who led her to the buyer in the state and that they both shared the money equally.”
“On interrogation, Mary Olatayo confessed to the police that she has sold the baby to someone in Anambra State at the rate of six hundred thousand naira.
“Her confession led to the arrest of Chioma Esther Ogbonna who also corroborated Mary’s claims.
“Further investigation revealed that Mary Olatayo a native of Omu-Aran in Kwara state is a call girl, who sees the baby as a disturbance to her business hence she decided to do away with the baby.”
“Fortunately for her, she has an accomplice in Chioma, a native of Imo state who quickly contacted the buyer in Anambra state.”
Meanwhile, the Commissioner of Police, Lanre Bankole, has ordered the transfer of the suspects to the trafficking and child labour unit of the State CIID for further investigation.
CP Bankole also directed that everything legal must be done to recover the sold baby.
