Adeola Omoniyi, 22, a suspected kidnapper, disclosed how much her father, Ilesanmi Omoniyi, paid her after each operation.

The state police command in Akure, the capital of Ondo state, paraded Adeola, who specialized in kidnapping young children from communities there.

The suspect said it was her third mission when she was caught at Ore in the state’s Odigbo Council area.

During an interview, the suspect said that she had been giving her father, Omoniyi, the kidnapped children in exchange for N30,000 per operation.

“I’m a kidnapper. I do kidnap little children and I always deliver them to my father in his house at Igbotako. I was successful with the first two children I took but I was caught with the third one.

“After delivering the kids to my father, he would give me N30,000 for each operation. I do use the money to take care of myself. I don’t know what he normally used the children for. All I do is take them to him.

“He told me to always bring the children to him. I picked the first child from Ilutitun and the from Ilowo.

“It was when I was taking the child away that the mother raised alarm.

People gathered to beat me and I was taken to the police station before I was moved to Akure.

“I have been doing the business for about two years. The first one was in 2021 and the second one this year. I always ask the children when they are alone where are they going and I hold their hand and they will follow me.

However, the father who denied the allegation in an interview said that her daughter had been battling mental issues.

Omoniyi said that “My daughter used to stay in Lagos. She stayed  about two years in Lagos. She got sick and they brought her to me in Igbotako. She was stack naked when they brought her to me.

“I later took her to a church where the pastor said I should pay N80,000. I sold my cassava and I paid the pastor.

“He later told me that she is better but a few days after he called again that he could not find her as she had left the church.

“I’m not the one that she used to bring the kids to. I have never given her N30,000. It was six months after she left the church that we have been looking for her that I heard that she went to steal a child.”

The spokesperson for the state police command, Funmi Odunlami said that the suspects would soon be charged to court after the completion of the investigation.