•Police arrest female pastor, rescue 3 girls
By Victoria Edoho
A 54-year-old woman, Idowu Olupinla, has been arrested by the police in Ogun State for allegedly operating a prostitution cartel with teenagers.
She was picked up at her church premises on 52,Okesina Street Ijoko Ota.
The woman, who is a pastor and founder was paraded alongside some of her victims at Eleweran Police headquarters, Abeokuta. She was arrested at her church premises.
The police said she allegedly specialised in arranging male sex customers for the teenage girls, aged 14 to 16.
The police said three of the girls (names withheld) were rescued. The girls lived in the church premises with the woman.
One of the victims, aged 16 (names withheld) said many of the girls were from broken homes and looking for a place to stay before they were allegedly lured into prostitution by the woman.
She and nine other girls lived with Olupinla for about a year.
“We are about 10 with Mama, She always arranged men for us to have sex.” She created an apartment within the church premises, where the men slept with us. We charged N500 per sex in which Mama will collect N300 and give us N200.”
According to her, we realised about N1,500 per day with Olupinla’s commission included.
The girl also said many of the girls staying with the woman had series of abortion to enable them continue the business, but she has had five abortions.
The suspect, however, denied the allegations. Olupinla said she only provided a place to live for the homeless girls.
The Commissioner of Police , Ahmed Ilyasu, at a press briefing yesterday, said the victims had been taken to hospital.
He said the suspect would soon be charged to court for human trafficking and child abuse.