Police in Lagos have detained an executive director at ARM Pensions Abisola Onigbogi accused of rape by the company’s human resource partner, Ogochukwu Odogwu.
In a leaked letter addressed to an individual identified simply as Opeyemi, Ms Odogwu, 36, said on July 18 that Mr Onigbogi took her to the Limeridge Hotel located at Chevron Drive in Lekki and raped her.
She said Onigbogi was asked to take her home since they live in the same neighbourhood around Chevron Drive after she became tipsy at the office party.
Odogwu said her last memory of the party was about 7.30 p.m.
She said when she woke up around 3am, she found out she was in a hotel with clothes and a wig in a pile, saying her private parts were sore and “I felt like someone had invaded me.”
Odogwu further said: “I walked out of the room, looked around for a clue of the name of the hotel to even have a sense of where I was, I saw the name Limeridge hotel, I googled it, and I found that it’s on Chevron drive.”
She said she checked her WhatsApp messages and saw that Onigbogi had sent me a message that he was with her laptop bag and ID card.
Odogwu said she confronted Onigbogi and he said he took her to a hotel because she was incoherent and could not give her address.
“He also denied knowledge of what ensued in the hotel room when she was unconscious,” she said.
Odogwu said she returned to the hotel to see the CCTV footage the next day, saying the receptionist showed her evidence that Onigbogi paid for the hotel room at 10:05 p.m.
She said in the footage played for her, she was seen leaning on Onigbogi “and he was holding my shoes and a hand on my back guiding me into the hotel at about 15.52 and was seen leaving at 17:36”.
She said she reported the situation to her family and had a rape kit test done at Island Maternity on Friday and also reported the case to Ikoyi Police Station.
The hotel’s operations manager Owowumi Ewarawon told Premium Times that Odogwu was conscious when she was brought to the hotel, adding that the duo went in like “boyfriend and girlfriend.”
Lagos police spokesman Benjamin Hundeyin confirmed to the online newspaper on Wednesday that the suspect is in custody.
“The outcome of our investigation will determine if he will go to court or not. But I can confirm he is in our custody,” he said.
