A seven-year-old boy was on Thursday caught after he broke into a house in the Olomi area of Ibadan, Oyo State, stealing two phones and N4,000.
According to a report by the Nigerian Tribune Newspaper, the boy also cooked rice, ate all the meat in the pot and drank the milk found there.
It was that the boy opened the padlock with a key to gain entry into the room.
He was said to have opened the wardrobe, rummaged through clothes and stole N4,000 kept there. He allegedly stole two mobile phones.
He also went to the younger wife’s room but couldn’t find anything to steal.
He was said to have proceeded to the kitchen, cooked rice in a kettle with a camp gas and ate all the meat he found in the pot.
After the first meal, he reportedly drank the milk he also found.
He was said to have kept the phones with a woman in the neighbourhood and ran out of the elderly woman’s house, telling her that he would be back despite her query on how the phones came about.
According to the boy during confession, he went to his grandmother’s room where he claimed he gave her N2,000 he stole.
But the occupant of the burgled room said he stole N4,000 from there.
By the time he returned to his place of operation, the rice he put on fire had got burnt but this did not stop him from eating the remnant.
He was said to be on this when he heard footsteps and quickly ran to the backyard.
The boy admitted to opening the front door with a cutlass and cooked rice twice, drank milk and took N2,000 to his grandmother after which he returned to the house.
He said: “Unfortunately for me, one of those living in the house met me there but I told a lie that it was a boy who came there to steal.”
He said further: “I have broken into four houses in the last two days before I was caught today (Thursday).”
Musibau, one of the sons of Mr Hassan Fatai, whose house was burgled, said: “The boy ran to the backyard when he heard footsteps. We met all doors ajar and saw him at the backyard. When asked about who went into the house, he said it was a boy. He said he knew the boy and took us somewhere but we found nobody. He told us again that he knew where the boy kept the flask in which he put the rice he cooked. He took us there and brought out the flask.
“He promised to bring the boy to us if he sees him. We became suspicious that he must know something about the house-breaking and stealing. We told him that we suspected him and would report him to the police.
“That was how he started confessing that he was the one who broke in.”
The vigilante commandant of Oluyole Local Government, Olusegun Idowu, told the Nigerian Tribune Newspaper that he and his men had been in search of the boy’s father, Ahmed Rasheed, said to a commercial motorcycle operator.
When he was told of his son’s misdemeanour, Rasheed was said to have signed an undertaking to take him away from the community, and also agreed that the law should take its course if refuses to take care of his son or if he comes back to the community to steal again.
The victims said that they decided not to report him to the police because of his age and also because they didn’t want to spend money and time pursuing the case with the police.
