Man faces charge of murder in death of student who posted ‘life update’ video day before killing
A day before the strangled body of Irene Yemitan was found at an Alief-area home, she told friends and family she was busy taking classes at Houston Community College.
“Where have I been? What have I been doing,” Yemitan said in a YouTube video published on Sept. 4. “So basically, I’ve been at school — living my best life.”
In the same video titled “Life Update,” she identified herself as Nigerian and bemoaned the heat.
“I am Nigerian and I live in a house where they do not believe in AC,” Yemitan said, fanning herself.
She pledged to publish another video to reveal a surprise but never did. The next day, her body was discovered stashed in the bedroom of Alex Jude Akpan, the man now accused of killing her.
Akpan was charged with murder Wednesday night in her death, Harris County Sheriff’s Office officials announced.
For nearly a week, Yemitan had remained unidentified until the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences shared photos of her face and the clothes she was wearing in hopes of finding her loved ones.
In a May 16 video, Yemitan showed off what appeared to be the same black-and-white jersey from Forever 21 that was shared by the medical examiner. She was identified as the mystery woman Wednesday morning.
A relative who on Wednesday answered the door at her family’s home in Twin Oaks Village said Yemitan’s mother last spoke to her the morning after her last video.
The family declined to speak
other than to say they did not know 24-year-old Akpan.
Akpan was arrested and initially charged with tampering with evidence of a human corpse after Yematin’s body was found in his bedroom in the 9600 block of Wellsworth Drive, near Bissonnet and Eldridge Parkway. He was released from custody after posting a $10,000 bond and arrested again at his home Wednesday evening.
No one answered the door at the duplex Tuesday and Wednesday.
For those who knew Yemitan, the aspiring beauty stylist was a sweet person who always remained smiling, even in the face of adversity.
“Her soul was too beautiful for this world,” said Quaneisha Morris, who went to high school with Yemitan. “Irene had the biggest heart, the most pure heart.”
Friends on Twitter came for “No ward Tuesday and Wednesday in an outpouring of love for the slain student. Courtni Batts, who met Yemitan in a high school summer school program, said she saw the photo released by the medical examiner’s office and noticed the resemblance. Batts didn’t believe it was her friend until she spoke with other people who knew of the situation, she said.
“I started crying,” Batts said. “It’s really hard to take, just because she died very, very tragically.”
Batts and Morris knew of Yemitan’s YouTube channel, where she often talked about her life and offered advice to anyone struggling in relationships. She was bullied in middle school and high school, but always kept smiling, Morris said.
matter what people did to her or said to her, she was always kind,” Morris said.
Yemitan’s friends on Twitter expressed shock about her death and many lamented how she’d been bullied in school.
“Irene was the sweetest most compliment giving human being I ever met in my life,” Twitter user @SanBoomKid said. “This is sad beyond words”
Morris confirmed Yemitan was involved in the Nigerian community. She was incredibly funny, Batts said.
Akpan was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in 2017, but his case was dismissed.