MICHAEL AKINOLA
A 31-year old man, Christian Tochukwu Edeh, has murdered his 49-year old lover, Miss Ijeoma Phyllis, carted away her properties worth millions of Naira including her car and escaped in order not to get married to her after gifting him a Toyota Highlander SUV in FCT, Abuja.
P.M.EXPRESS reports that the incident happened at Lugbe area of Abuja, where the suspect, Edeh, who hails from Nara Unateze in Nkanu East Local Government Area of Enugu State, committed the alleged dastardly act before he fled to Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
However, he was later arrested by Police operatives from the Intelligence Team led by DCP Olatunji Disu in his hideout, where he squatted with a single mother, who is his new found love.
The suspect, Edeh, was brought back to Abuja and detained at IRT, Guzape Abuja office of the intelligence team for interrogation. He was arrested through very credible and reliable information about the suspect’s movement, which was received by the officers after a complaint was received at their office.
During interrogation, the suspect claimed that he was a graduate of Mass Communication from the Federal Polytechnic in Nasarawa State and resided at Abuja before the sad incident happened.
He told the Police that he unintentionally murdered her on 23rd October, 2022, at the deceased’s apartment after a quarrel between them at Lugbe over marriage.
He confessed to having used a pestle to perform the dastardly act on that fateful day after the lady invited him to her house and picked up a quarrel with him over his refusal to initiate marriage proposals and sundry issues.
According to him, he got into relationship with the older lady after they met at an event during the Covid-19 lockdown around March 2020. They started visiting each other, the lady began pressing him to get married to her and gifted him a Toyota Highlander SUV in order for him to consummate the union.
He further said that he was unemployed when the relationship started and had to go back to school to read phonology before he later got a job at a private school as an administrator and teaching staff before the killing of the late lover.
On how the dastardly act was perfected, he confessed that on that fateful day when he visited her, she asked him to eat but he refused having resolved to avoid her due to her quarrels and character. She then demanded that he should return the car gift and when he did not, she went for the pestle to attack him.
He added that it was when he woke up and found her with the pestle that he grabbed the object, overpowered her and hit her with it. The deceased immediately fell down and started shooting “somebody help me! somebody help me!! somebody help me!!! and he fled the scene.
Upon interrogation by the Police team led by Tunji Disu on why he allegedly made away with her Toyota Corolla, iphone, mobile phones and other personal effects of the deceased before he was arrested by the Police, he said that it was because he did not want her to know where he was while adding that he did not envisage her death as a result of the assault.
He stated that he quickly sold the Toyota Corolla car at N1.7m two days after the incident before he was arrested by the Police team.
The matter got exposed after the caretaker of the compound, which the deceased rented, called and informed her sister of her disappearance. The sister then went to the Lugbe Police Division with her husband to lodge a complaint on the crime.
It was the Police and some friends of the deceased that forced her house open and recovered her decomposing body wrapped with rug carpet and the corpse was deposited at the mortuary for autopsy report.