Football Coach Arrested For Allegedly Sodomising Teenage Players In Lagos

Football Coach Arrested: The Lagos State Police Command has arrested a football coach for allegedly sodomising three of his teenage players in the Agege area of the state.

The suspect, Frank Darlington, 49, who is currently cooling off in police custody, was accused of ‘forcefully’ having carnal knowledge of his players through the anus.

Darlington, the manager of Soccer Warriors Football Academy, Pen Cinema, was arrested on Thursday by the Elere Police Division, after one of the victims told to his parents, who invited the police.

It was gathered that the suspect, a native of Imo State, allegedly took three footballers to his house on separate occasions after training sessions, and sodomised them – with promises that he would help them advance their football career to clubs overseas.

The police said the suspect always invited the boys to his house after school hours and allegedly penetrated their anuses at separate occasions, threatening that they would surely die the day they ever reveal the secret to anyone.

One of the boys (names withheld) became uncomfortable with the act and stopped visiting the coach.

Apparently peeved by the boy’s action, Darlington stormed the boy’s school where he is also a football coach and threatened the boy with death.

At that point, the teenager, who became fearful, let the ‘cat out of the bag’ to his parents, who reported the matter to the police.

The victim said: “He always had sex with me and with most of us. He started last year. The first time he approached me was after a training session. We were on the football pitch and he said my performance was bad and I should meet him at home for a discussion.

“When I went, he and two boys were at home. His wife did not stay with him. He sent the two boys on an errand and asked me to come into his room. He then instructed me to remove my trousers, and he molested me.

“He did not use any protection. He did not give me any money, but he threatened that I would die if I told anyone. I cannot count how many times he had done this to me. I told my mother when I was tired of his abuse. My mother reported him at the police station.”

The Punch gathered that in his confessional statement, the suspect, while admitting to the crime, said he derived pleasure in it.

He said, “I have a female daughter, and she is three years old. I manage the Soccer Warriors Football Academy in the Pen Cinema, Agege area. It was in February 2015 that the rape started. I usually had sex with my boys just to play with them. It was romance. We had fun together. The last one I did was in July 2016, knowing that it could get me into trouble.

“I slept with only three of my footballers. There was one of my boys that had not been coming for training since last week. When I asked after him, I was told that he was sick. I did not know that he had reported to his mother and she had told the police.

“I do not know what moved me to be sleeping with them. I have been coaching for about 12 years. My wife stays in the South-East. She left me in March 2016. The sex with the boys was not for any ritual. I only derived fun from it.

“I knew it was a crime and that was why I stopped this act since July. I pledged not to go back into this.”

The Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni, who paraded the club manager, said the suspect would be charged to court at the end of investigation, adding that:

“There is no place for criminals to hide in the state. We enjoin the residents of Lagos to report suspicious movements and persons to the police.”

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