An Osun State high court sitting in Ile-Ife, presided over by Justice Adedotun Onibokun, yesterday sentenced a couple, Mr. Fatai Jimoh and Lateefat Jimoh to death by hanging for the murder of one Mrs. Bukola Taiwo of Ikeketu, Ile Ife.
On August 12, 2009, the convicts conspired together to murder Mrs. Taiwo at Ikeketu Village, near Garage Olode in Ife South
Local Council of Osun State.
Mr. Jimoh, who went into the room of the deceased, where she normally slept whenever she came from Ibadan to buy palm oil, strangulated her while his wife, Lateefat, used a sledgehammer to smash the head of the deceased, which led to her death. The convicts also took away a wallet containing a sum of N48,780 belonging to the deceased.The prosecuting counsel from the state Ministry of Justice, Mr. Moses Faremi, called four witnesses, including a police inspector, a pathologist from the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan, the Baale of Ikeketu and a neighbour, who saw what happened and alerted others.
The convicts in their confessional statement made to the police stated that they broke into the room where the deceased kept kegs of palm oil and sold some of them with a promise to pay later.
But in her judgment, Justice Onibokun found the convicts guilty on two counts of murder, armed robbery and sentenced them to death by hanging.
There was weeping and wailing inside the court as the judge delivered the verdict and policemen present had to order two aged men who were weeping out of the court room.
