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Comedian, Emmanuel Adigwe, popularly known as D' Lecturer is in the business of making people laugh. But at the moment, he is not laughing as a result of the injuries he claimed he sustained from men of the Nigerian Police on Monday night while on his way from Ojodu, Lagos, where he had gone to perform the function of the master of ceremonies at a birthday party.

D' Lecturer

According to Adigwe, his parish priest had begged him to help an accident victim to Bariga. The comedian claimed to have missed his way at Gbagada after dropping his passenger and had stopped to ask for direction from passersby.

"I met a traffic officer who directed me, but I didn't know the description he gave me was wrong. When I eventually discovered this, I decided to stop at a police check point to ask for the correct description," Adigwe said.

However, his quest for help earned him the beating of his life for he alleged the police men were not in the least bit interested in his story. The policemen, he said, ordered him to pull over and queried him for driving against traffic.

"I parked and I tried to explain to them why I took 'one way' but they just didn't want to hear me out. They asked for my driver's license which I gave them and they seized it immediately. At that moment, my parish priest called me to find out where I was. I told him what was happening and he told me to wait there and that he was coming to meet us," Adigwe said.

The policemen, unwilling to wait for Adigwe's parish priest, all got into Adigwe's car and ordered him to drive off.

"They were five in number. I asked them where we were going, but they shouted at me. I offended them further when I begged them to wait for my parish priest. At this point, they came out of the car, handcuffed me and beat me mercilessly for 30 minutes," he said.

Adigwe said that while some were beating him, the others called the DPO in charge of Pedro Police Station who eventually came to the scene.

"It was the DPO that ordered them to unlock the handcuffs before we all went to the police station."

Already at the station were the priest and the person whose birthday he had attended.

"The DPO and his men changed the story. They said I was fighting the policemen. It was my parish priest who asked them how an unarmed person could fight five armed policemen," Adigwe said.

Adigwe said it got to a point when the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Samuel Jinadu, called and told the DPO to release him.

"They eventually allowed me to leave around 11 pm. That was how I sustained all these injuries. I even told them I was a comedian, but my pleadings fell on deaf ears. I didn't know that I could be subjected to such brutality," Adigwe said.

When Crime Digest contacted the Lagos PPRO on telephone, he said he was not aware that Adigwe was brutalised by policemen. "I know he was arrested and later released, but I am unaware of his being brutalised by police officers from Pedro Police station," Jinadu said.