Man Disarms Robber, Engages Them in Shootout After Being Trailed From Bank in Minna

A man in Minna, Niger State, briefly turned the tables on armed robbers who followed him from a bank before attacking him at a residential complex on Friday.

Police said the victim, who had withdrawn several million naira from the bank, was trailed to a complex along Shiroro Road in the state capital. Two armed men later confronted him and robbed him of the cash, estimated at about N10 million.

The incident, captured in a video circulating online, shows the suspects arriving in a silver Toyota Corolla and approaching the victim, who was in a blue Toyota Camry. The men forced him out of his vehicle and took a bag containing the cash.

As the suspects attempted to leave, the victim resisted and managed to wrest a rifle from one of them. He fired the weapon during a brief exchange of gunfire that disrupted the robbers’ attempt to flee.

The attackers returned fire, forcing the victim to retreat as the shooting intensified. During the confrontation, the suspects transferred the stolen money from their car into the victim’s Camry before escaping in it. They abandoned the Corolla they had used to trail him.

In a video interview shared online, the victim said he initially mistook the armed men for police officers.

“Two of them came out of a car. I thought they were policemen and I asked what my offence was, but they started shooting,” he said. “I managed to snatch a gun from one of them and started shooting back.”

Niger State Police spokesperson SP Wasiu Abiodun confirmed the incident, saying it occurred at about 3 p.m. on March 6.

“Suspected armed robbers attacked a victim who was reportedly trailed from a bank to Shiroro Road,” Abiodun said. “The victim was robbed of a sum of money and his vehicle, while the robbers abandoned their own vehicle and escaped with the victim’s car.”

He added that the victim recovered a rifle from one of the suspects and handed it over to police officers from the Tudun-Wada Division who responded to the scene.

Police recovered the abandoned vehicle and transferred the case to the State Criminal Investigation Department in Minna.

Abiodun said efforts are ongoing to arrest the suspects. The victim’s car was later found on Saturday at a location where it had been abandoned.