Boyfriend to a female staff of Niger
Delta Development Commission, NDDC, Miss Sophia Phillips Horsefall, and two
others were, yesterday, arraigned at a Port Harcourt magistrate’s court by
Department of State Services, DSS, for stabbing her to death after she had
refused to make him, the boyfriend, her next-of-kin to her bank account as well
as her refusal to give him one million (N1 million) he had demanded from her.
The accused, Sotonye Martin,
Innocent Oluche and Wachukwu Ugochukwu committed the murder on November 8 this
year.
Counsel to the DSS, Mr C. S. Eze,
told the court that the first defendant, Mr. Sotonye Martin, lured the
deceased, who he had a 13-year-old daughter for, to the house of the second
defendant, Innocent Oluche, where he allegedly stabbed her to death.
He claimed the first and second
defendants later buried the deceased in a shallow grave, noting that they
invited the third defendant, Wachukwu Ugochukwu, a spiritualist, to perform
some rituals.
According to him, the accused were
brought before the court on a three-count charge which included “stabbing to
death with a jack knife and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section
316 and punishable under Section 319 of the Criminal Code Law, Laws of Rivers
State 1999.”
The accused did not take plea. Chief
Magistrate F. Alikor referred the casefile to the state Director of Public Prosecution,
saying her court did not have jurisdiction to entertain matters over murder
which was the second charge.
She remanded the accused in prison
custody and adjourned the matter indefinitely. Elder brother to the deceased,
Mr Amatu Phillips, while speaking to newsmen, alleged that his sister was
murdered by the boyfriend of 13 years, Mr. Martin because of her wealth. He
claimed she had some money in her account and confided in the boyfriend who
later kept on pestering her for financial support.
According to him, after the sister
had allegedly given him money several times, he came again demanding for N1
million which she refused. He alleged that the boyfriend later lured her to his
friend’s house, offered her a fruit juice drink which, unknown to the sister,
was drugged.
He alleged that when the boyfriend noticed
that she was dizzy from effect of the drug, he stabbed her on the neck,
demanding her ATM card and password. He claimed the boyfriend had before that
day persuaded his sister to change the name of her next of kin on her bank
details to his name.
Source:Vanguard
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Society