A middle-aged man has murdered a young lecturer working with the Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State.
The incident happened Friday night at Ifite village in Awka, the State capital.
It was gathered that the lecturer who lectured in the Psychology Department, simply identified as Chima Anolue, was murdered shortly after a brief argument with his houseboy, which led to a fight between the two.
This was corroborated by videos currently trending on social media, which show the suspect confessed to having killed the lecturer with a pestle.
He said, “When he returned, he told me to cook rice. And as I was cooking the rice, he asked me why I did not wash my plates. I did not reply to him anything. And then, he further asked why I wasn’t responding to his question.
“In the process, he slapped me. But I told him I usually have ear problems and that people don’t hit me. As I was saying that, he angrily asked if I was still talking while he was talking. And therefore, he slapped me again, brought out Cain, and started flogging me all over.
“Then, in the process, I got angry, and we started fighting. In the process of that fight, I picked up the pestle in the kitchen and hit him on the head.”
The suspect also confessed to hitting Chima with the pestle up to three times before he stopped after falling on the ground.
The video also shows the deceased lying lifeless in the hospital bed. At the same time, his bereaved relatives gathered to behold and mourn him, alongside his friends and some hospital officials who were also interrogating the suspect.
It was also gathered that while Chima’s friends and the suspect were taking him to the hospital that night for medical attention after the encounter, he (the suspect) attempted to choke him to death right inside the vehicle where he was sitting close to him.
“It was in the process that we discovered what was going on and therefore hit off his hand and started suspecting him. As that was going on also, the victim, who was still alive then, used his last strength to cough out the suspect’s name before he finally gave up the ghost,” said one of the eyewitnesses.
Meanwhile, the suspect was said to have denied knowing anything about Chima’s death but eventually confessed to the crime to the doctor on duty at the hospital that night.
“In his confessions, he first said that it was the deceased’s girlfriend who visited him that night that attacked him. However, he eventually confessed that he was the person who killed Chima with a pestle,” the source said.
A source close to the incident scene also alleged that the Abakaliki-born suspect bruised the deceased’s body with a knife after hitting him unconscious, making it appear as a third party attacked him. However, the suspect denied the allegation.
All the efforts made to get the reactions of the Spokesperson of the Anambra State Police Command, DSP Ikenga Tochukwu, on the matter proved abortive, as he was yet to respond to messages sent to him at the time of this publication.
