Blood On The Badge: Over 200 Dead, Hundreds Tortured All By Nigerian Police In Owerri, Yet IGP Promotes Accused

Secrets Reporters

The Imo State Police has deliberately refused to respond to questions regarding the operations of the Anti-Kidnapping Unit of the Command, known as Tiger Base, seen for operating as a center for systematic torture, extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, and defiance of legal authorities.

SecretsReporters reached out to the command on Wednesday 17th December 17, 2025 via Assistant Commissioner of Police ACP Mike Abattam through a phone call and he was observed to have deliberately refused to respond to the reporter on the matter as kept quiet after he was asked questions even though he confirmed he could hear the reporter. The call was placed twice and he acted same manner, an attitude seen as a strategy to frustrate the reporter and possibly blame it on bad network.  A document obtained by SecretsReporters revealed that at least 200 deaths in custody occurred at the facility between January 2021 and November 2025, with evidence pointing to many more unreported cases. Former detainees described nightly executions involving three to twenty people, followed by disposal of bodies without notifying families, while independent autopsies were consistently blocked.

Coordinator Sanyaolu Juwon, Coalition Against Police Tiger Base Impunity described Tiger Base as synonymous with death, torture, and disappearance in Imo State, stating that the documented practices amount to systematic state-sanctioned murder carried out with complete impunity. Officers, he alleged, torture detainees to death, ignore court orders and directives from the Inspector General of Police, and even kill individuals after interventions by the National Human Rights Commission, only to receive promotions and awards afterward.

The report details torture as a standard practice, with designated chambers inside the facility where methods include severe beatings, suspension from trees leading to permanent disabilities, hanging, starvation, and denial of medical care. Survivors examined by researchers showed scars, bruises, and traces of dried blood. One victim recounted being hanged from a tree for hours, after which officers demanded two million naira from his family; unable to pay, he faced terrorism charges and permanent injuries that left him unable to raise his arms or stand for long periods.

Enforced disappearances feature prominently, with multiple cases of arrested individuals vanishing entirely despite family inquiries. Reverend Cletus Nwachukwu Egole was taken in February 2021 along with his wife and eight children; the children endured seven days of torture, the wife over a year in detention before bail, but Reverend Egole has never been seen again, reportedly killed in July 2021 without any official accounting. His wife testified that the last time she saw him was upon arrival at the facility. Another case involves Chinonso Eluchie, a motorcycle taxi operator arrested in September 2025 while buying fuel and held incommunicado, with officers shifting explanations from denial of custody to accusations of terrorism and supplying food to terrorists. When his wife persisted, the unit’s commander allegedly threatened to kill him if she continued making noise.

The report highlights defiance of oversight bodies, noting that even National Human Rights Commission interventions, backed by presidential authority and Inspector General approvals, fail to protect detainees. Magnus Ejiogu, arrested in September 2025, died in October despite commission documentation of torture and an approved transfer order that Tiger Base operatives obstructed by claiming completed investigations; police later attributed the death to sudden illness without independent autopsy or suspensions.

Extortion schemes reportedly force payments ranging from two hundred thousand to twenty million naira for release, with amounts influenced by political vetting—names sent to government house to check ruling party affiliation, leading to higher demands or indefinite detention for opposition supporters. When targets evade arrest, family members including spouses, children, and parents are taken as hostages. Melody Eberechi Anyanwu, then 21 and four months pregnant, was detained in May 2021 with her 62-year-old father after officers missed her boyfriend; the father died after five days, she lost her pregnancy from beatings including stomps to her stomach, and endured six months without charge.

Officers routinely defy court orders to produce detainees, conduct autopsies, or honor bail. Japhet Njoku, a 32-year-old security guard and new father, died in May 2025 after two months of torture over theft allegations; despite coroner directives for autopsy and testimony, officers refused appearances, blocked procedures, and fabricated charges against witnesses, with no autopsy performed and the commander later promoted. Obinna Orji, arrested in November 2024, remained unproduced despite a June 2025 court order noting eight months of detention, just 900 meters from the facility.

At least eight cases involve arrests of journalists, activists, lawyers, and government critics on fabricated charges, contributing to Imo State’s ranking as the worst place for journalists in Nigeria per the 2024 Openness Index. Former commissioner Fabian Ihekweme, after criticizing land allocation and project costs, faced 61 days at Tiger Base in late 2024 and early 2025 without medical care or lawyer access; a January 2025 court ruling declared the detention illegal.

Former detainees also reported forced labor on facility maintenance and officers’ private properties. Operatives wear plain clothes without identification, obscuring accountability as noted during a June 2025 National Preventive Mechanism visit.

Most alarmingly, implicated officers receive promotions; commander Oladimeji Adeyeyiwa advanced to Assistant Commissioner of Police in August 2025 amid protests and earned Best Crime Buster of the Year 2024 in June. Similar patterns appear elsewhere, including past SARS heads reassigned to oversight roles despite indictments.

Institutional failures enable these abuses, with complaints looping back to police for self-investigation, oversight bodies denied access, and courts ignored without repercussions. The practices violate the Nigerian Constitution, Anti-Torture Act 2017, Police Act 2020, and international treaties including the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Convention Against Torture, and African Charter.

The report draws from interviews with 18 current Owerri prison detainees previously held at Tiger Base, former detainees, victims’ families, lawyers, court records, National Preventive Mechanism findings, human rights defenders, and physical examinations of survivors.

CAPTI demands immediate suspension of Adeyeyiwa and implicated officers, independent investigations into deaths with autopsies, accounting for disappeared persons, prosecutions, structural reforms including uniforms and transparent records, reparations, court compliance enforcement, promotion reversals, strengthened oversight, and probes into organ trafficking allegations. The coalition is submitting findings to UN rapporteurs, African Commission, ECOWAS Court, and diplomatic missions.

While focused on Imo, the report frames Tiger Base within a national police accountability crisis post-2020 EndSARS protests, warning it exemplifies a system that incentivizes impunity.

Victims’ voices underscore the trauma: Mrs. Ifeyinwa Egole on her husband’s disappearance, Njoku’s family on a child growing up fatherless due to state actions, a survivor refusing false confession despite torture, and a journalist describing threats of execution followed by labeling as IPOB members with planted evidence.