Eight people are accused in the rape and murder of Olajide Blessing Omowumi, a 24-year-old University of Ilorin student, but THREE of them have been convicted and sentenced by the Kwara state High Court after a one and half year legal battle.Â
Two of the three have been sentenced to die by hanging, while the remaining one was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Court.
On 2nd June, 2021, the 300-level Agricultural Sciences student was found dead in her sister’s home with her mouth gagged with clothes and bruises on her private part.
Dr. Kayode Adeniyi, a pathologist at the UITH told to the court that the autopsy revealed that she was raped and strangled to death.
They eight prime suspects were brought before the court by the Kwara State government in suit No KWS/33c/c/2021 on 11-count charge bordering on armed robbery, illegal possession of firearms and rape.
Abdulazeez Ismail, Ajala Oluwatimileyin (aka Jacklord), Oyeyemi Omogbolahan, Abdulkarim Shuaib (aka Easy), Kareem Rasheed (Rashworld), Abdullateef Abdulrahman, Daud Adebayo (aka Bashman) and Akande Taiye Oladojawere, were arrested in connection with the rape and murder.
Abdulazeez Ismail, Ajala Oluwatimileyin and Oyeyemi Omogbolahan, with the offences of culpable homicide punishable with death, conspiracy to commit robbery and conspiracy to murder.
While the fourth and the fifth names above were sentenced to three years in imprisonment for the offence of theft.
The sixth, seventh and eight suspects with names Abdullateef Abdulrahman, Daud Bashir Aderayo and Akande Taiye Oladoja were discharged and acquitted on the basis that they were not found guilty of any charges against them.
Prosecution counsel and former Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Salman Jawondo, who started the case as Attorney General of Kwara State said:
‘The first, second and third defendants who are the main culprits were found guilty of culpable homicide punishable with death, conspiracy to commit robbery and cospiracy to murder.
‘They were accordingly sentenced to death, which is the maximum. There’s no discretion for the court to exercise by virtue of provision of the armed robbery Act, it’s death.
‘So also by virtue of section 221 of the penal code, it’s death sentence for culpable homicide. So, they were accordingly sentenced to death.
‘Although, the third defendant, who was also convicted of rape was sentenced to life imprisonment, but it’s neither here nor there. When somebody is condemned, the life imprisonment does not ameliorate anything.
‘With respect to the fourth and fifth defendants, they were found guilty of conspiracy to steal and stealing of money in the bank account of the deceased.
‘You know, after killing her, they took her ATM card, Sim card and her phone.
‘They changed her password, through instrumentality of the fourth and fifth defendants, who are experts in computer manipulation, collected some money through transfer, totalling about N149,000.
‘They were convicted for conspiracy and stealing/theft. They were accordingly sentenced to three years imprisonment to run concurrently.
‘For conspiracy, one year, for main offence three years, commencing from the date of their arrest.
‘They’ve spent about one and half years already in custody.
He continued,
‘The other three: sixth, seventh and eighth escaped by whiskers. They are very lucky. If you look at their involvement, they only assisted to dispose of property stolen.
‘The irony of it all is that all those involved are very young men of 19, 23 etc. It’s quite unfortunate. And that tells that we have to work on our future in this country,’ he said.
The 165-typewritten-page judgement read by Justice Yusuf got almost the courtroom shedding tears while being, even leaving the judge sobbing openly for more than two minutes while recounting the process of how the deceased was raped, leading to her death.
However, Justice Yusuf held that the gang only had the intention of theft and rape without the intention to kill, but unfortunately, their act led to homicide.
