The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has charged 24-year-old Nigerian national, Damilola Bamigboye, for resisting arrest and abducting an agent of the Department of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), according to court documents reviewed by Peoples Gazette.
Authorities say Bamigboye was under surveillance for overstaying his student visa when what was meant to be a routine arrest on December 10 escalated into a hostage situation involving a federal officer.
He was charged alongside Rekeya Frazier, alleged accomplice in the incident.
Last Wednesday, a team of HSI agents was parked outside Bamigboye’s apartment in Plymouth, Minnesota, monitoring his Kia Optima.
The unmarked vehicle, equipped with sirens and lights, was joined by a Jeep SUV, in which Bamigboye was a front-seat passenger, and a woman identified as Ms Frazier was driving.
According to the FBI, Bamigboye, who noticed the agents, masked his face and moved items from the front to the back seat. When agents approached and identified themselves, he resisted.
“He yelled at Frazier, ‘Drive! Drive! Drive! Get in the car and drive now’, or words to that effect,” FBI Special Agent Terry Getsch wrote in a report to David Schultz, U.S. magistrate judge, district of Minnesota.
The report detailed a chaotic struggle as agents attempted to subdue Bamigboye while Ms Frazier drove away, dragging one agent along.
The situation escalated until the Jeep stopped near the New Hope Police Department, where Bamigboye fled into a grocery store and was subsequently apprehended. Ms Frazier was eventually taken into custody by uniformed police officers.
Bamigboye initially declined to speak to the FBI but later admitted to wrestling with a federal officer and instructing Ms Frazier to drive away, attributing his actions to post-traumatic stress disorder from a prior kidnapping in Nigeria.
“The 24-year-old claimed he acted the way he had because he had PTSD from having been previously kidnapped while living in his active country of Nigeria,” Mr Getsch wrote to the judge.
The FBI concluded that there was substantial reason to believe Bamigboye and Frazier intended to abduct a federal officer, citing probable violations of Title 18, U.S. Code, Section 111, which covers assaults on federal officials.
Bamigboye has been formally charged following an arraignment before federal magistrate judge David Schultz in Hennepin County, Minnesota.