An Ondo State High Court sitting in Akure on Wednesday, sentenced Seidu Adeyemi, the boyfriend of Miss Khadijat Oluboyo, daughter of Lasisi Olugbenga Oluboyo, immediate past Deputy Governor of Ondo State, to death.
The decomposing corpse of Khadijat was found in a shallow grave under a bed at the Adeyemi Aratunsi’s residence in Oke Aro area of Akure in July 2018, after she was declared missing by her parents.
Before her gruesome death, Khadijat, also known as ‘Princess Nikky’, was also a final-year student of the Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko (AAUA).
Adeyemi who was said to be dating the deceased before he murdered her, was nabbed by a special team of detectives from the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Ondo State Police Command in Akure on July 10, 2018, after his younger brother discovered the shallow grave he buried her in his room and reported to their dad.
On July 16, 2018, 25-year-old Adeyemi was later charged and arraigned at a Magistrate Court in Akure, the Ondo State capital. He appeared before Chief Magistrate Bob Manuel Victoria at Oke Eda Magistrate Court in Akure before the case was later moved to the Ondo State High Court.
In his verdict on Wednesday, Justice Samuel Bola said the prosecutor had proved the case beyond reasonable doubt.
Bola noted that the evidence, which was provided before the court, proved that Adeyemi murdered the deceased for money ritual purposes before burying her for six days.
He disclosed that the death of the deceased emanated from injuries she sustained from the hands of the accused.
According to the judge, the accused person murdered Khadijat intentionally and the claims that she was killed by the two men he invited to his room in his conventional statement, as an attempt to cover up his evil deed.
”It was the defendant that killed the deceased person and not any two men as he claimed. It was an attempt to cover up that he claimed that two men he invited to his room strangulated the deceased,” he said.
“That he was threatened by the two men cannot exonerate the defendant, because he had the opportunity to the raise the alarm when he said the two men asked him to bring a shovel and digger from the house.
“This court finds it difficult to believe that the two men invited by the deceased murdered her in his room and he dug a shallow grave, where she was buried and he fetched the cement which was used to plaster the grave and he covered it with rug.
“The act of killing the deceased was intentional. Evidence showed that the deceased was last seen with the defendant and she never came out of his room alive, but her decomposing corpse recovered after five days and by criminal law, the convict committed a capital offence and he should die by hanging.”
The judge thereafter passed final judgment.
Addressing newsmen after the judgement, Kola Olawoye, the lead prosecution counsel and Ondo State Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, said the state government was interested in the case due to the circumstances that led to the death of Miss Khadijat.
He described the circumstances as unfortunate, while adding that justice was served at last and would be a lesson to criminal-like minds.
“The state decided to take up the case in order to know what led to the death of the deceased, and we wanted the defendant to explain to the whole world the part he took in the killing of the lady if any. Thank God the court has done justice to the case today,” he said.
