A Delta State man, Michael James, has admitted to allegedly staging his own kidnapping in a bid to extort ₦25 million from his family, according to a report by Punch Newspaper on Monday, July 6, 2026.
In a video of his interrogation released by the Delta State Police Public Relations Officer, Bright Edafe, James said he devised the plan after spending money belonging to his brother and sister and being unable to repay them.
James said the incident began on July 1 when he was asked to dispose of household refuse. Instead of returning home, he abandoned the wheelbarrow and hid in a nearby bush before calling his family to demand a fabricated ₦25 million ransom.
He admitted later calling his mother and falsely claiming that kidnappers were flogging him and demanding ₦700,000. “They kept calling me, but I did not answer. Later, when I picked up, I told her that the kidnappers were flogging me and that she should transfer ₦700,000 to them,” he said.
James said he became worried after his mother informed him that police and local vigilantes had begun searching for him. Fearing the plot would be exposed, he left his hiding place when rain threatened, travelled to another location on a motorcycle, and later called his family to falsely claim he had escaped from his supposed abductors.
