How mother, son conspired with ‘cleric’ to kill final year student – Police
The police in Ogun State have arrested a 42-yearold self-acclaimed cleric, a 23-year-old man and his mother for allegedly conspiring to kill a final year student of Lagos State University (LASU) for ritual purpose.
The cleric was identified as Segun Phillip of a white garment church while the other suspects were identified as Adeeko Owolabi and Mrs. Adeeko. It was learnt that the victim, Miss Favour Daley-Oladele was Owolabi’s girlfriend and a final year student of sociology in LASU.
The deceased reportedly left home to an unknown destination on December 8 and following her failure to return home for days, her parents were said to have reported the victim missing at Mowe Police Station.
The spokesperson of the police in the state, Abimbola Oyeyemi, in a statement on Sunday, stated that upon the report, the DPO Mowe division, Marvis Jayeola detailed his crack detectives to unravel the mystery behind the sudden disappearance of the 22-yearold girl.
Efforts of the detectives paid off when movement of the deceased was traced to a white garment church in Ikoyi-Ile,
Osun State, he said. He added that Philip, who claimed to be the pastor in charge of the church was arrested and he informed the detectives that Owolabi brought the deceased to the church.
He said during interrogation, Owolabi confessed that he lured his girlfriend (the deceased) to Ikoyi-Ile where “he has perfected plans with the so-called pastor to use her for money making ritual.
“He (Owolabi) stated further that while the girl was sleeping, the pastor gave him a pestle with which he used to smashed the head of the girl and the pastor quickly used a knife to cut off her neck, ripped open her chest and removed her heart which he used in preparing a concoction for him and his mother (Mrs Adeeko) to eat.”
The police spokesperson said when Owolabi was asked what led him to commit the crime, he explained that he “decided to go into money ritual because things were not going well with his parents economically, most especially with his mother who used to be the breadwinner of the family; and when he sought for assistance from the pastor, he was asked to bring a human being for that purpose and the available person at that time was his girlfriend.”
He added that the Commissioner of Police, Kenneth Ebrimson had ordered the immediate transfer of the suspects to the Homicide Section of the State criminal investigation and intelligence department for proper investigation. Oyeyemi also quoted the CP to have described the killing as “superlative degree of wickedness” and vowed to ensure that all the suspects face the full wrath of the law.
In a separate interview with Daily Trust, Oyeyemi said the mother had already paid N210,000 out of N250,000, which the self-acclaimed cleric billed them for the ritual service.