After being found guilty for beheading his setep mother with a cutlass, a 23 year old cattle rearer, Adamu Ibrahim, of Nbanghe village in Gombi Local Government Area of Adamawa state has been sentenced to death by hanging by a Yola High Court.
Adamu who was tried by the court for culpable homicide punishable with death contrary to section 221(a) of the state penal code, was convicted and sentenced to death by the state High Court presided by Justice Abdul-Azeez Waziri.
Adamu who was arraigned on 3 count charges, denied committing the offence. But in an effort to prove it case against him earlier, the prosecution assembled 3 witnesses who were all police officers that played key role in the investigation of the case.
But the convict in an evidence tendered in court, confessed to have killed his step mother, Aishau Ibrahim on the 26th February, 2015, at Nbanghe village in Gombi LGA.
According to him, he waited when everybody was away on that fateful day including his mother and sister who travelled to Zamfara before killing her.
He narrated that when he discovered that it was only himself and the deceased that were left in the house, he took his cutlass and met his step mother in her room, saying he asked her to go to her parents' house because he did not want her in their house.
According to him, they started exchanging words with each other during which he used cutlass in his possession and hacked her, saying he beheaded her head with the cutlass and took the head to an ant hill where he hid it there and went his way to a local market.
He added that when he came back home in the evening, he met her death body in the room, and that he came out and met his friend, Lawandi Tukur, and informed him that he had found the death body of his fathers' wife in her room without a head.
He said that he pretended as if he was not the one that killed her, and told his friend that he had found his step mother's death body in her room.
Adamu said that it was one Gajara that invited the police from Gombi division who came to the their house, and that the police in the course of investigation saw blood stain on his cap and his cutlass, and that from there he was arrested in connection with the killing.
The convict added that he later confessed to had hacked late Aishatu, and that he later took the police to the scene of the crime and where he hid the head.
Delivering its judgement on the matter on Tuesday, the Honourable Court presided over by Justice Abdul-Azeez Waziri, convicted and sentenced the defendant to death by hanging.
Justice Waziri, declared that based on the confessional statement of the convict, the prosecution has been able to proved that the said Aishatu Ibrahim was hacked to death by the callous act of the defendant.
He added that the confessional statement of the defendant is direct, positive and unequivocal, and therefore does not need corroboration at all to support the conviction of the defendant.
The Honourable Judge stated that the punishment under the the provision is a mandatory one, and that this being the position therefore, the court has convicted the defendant as charged and sentenced him to death by hanging.
Honourable Justice Waziri said that there is right of appeal to the Court of Appeal Yola Yola Judicial Division within 90 days from today.
In their separate reactions on the judgment, counsel to the prosecution, S. B. Digil and that of the convict, F. A. Ogbe, of the Legal Aid Council of Nigeria appreciated the the court for the judgment.
What an obnoxious act of the defendant that merited nothing less than the total condemnation by every human being. May the Lord continue to guide His lordship for the usual quick dispensation of Justice.
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