IT was double tragedy in Ondo State as a 47-year-old ex-banker, now a taxi driver, Jimoh Lateef, after ten years of marriage, stabbed his former wife, Amudat Oluwafunmilayo, to death and thereafter committed suicide by hanging. The marriage was blessed with five children before things fell apart between the couple who lived at Omoniyi quarters along Agbogbo area of Owo-Benin-Akure expressway.
The wife, 45, was a trader at Iloro market, Akure and hailed from Ijaraisin, Kwara State. The husband hailed from Osogbo, Osun State. A report said the couple had been estranged in the last two years with the husband threatening to kill the wife and then commit suicide. Sources said that their families members, after failing to reconcile them, agreed that they should separate for a while to allow time heal their troubled marriage following alleged battering of the wife by Jimoh.
However, it was learnt that, two weeks ago, the husband went to court for divorce and the court granted his request, but when Oluwafunmilayo went back to the house to pack her belongings, the husband pleaded with her not to leave him. The relationship between husband and wife took a tragic turn on Friday afternoon when one of their children after returning from school met his mum in the pool of her own blood and the body of his father dangling from the ceiling of their apartment. He reportedly raised the alarm which attracted neighbours and the whole community was thrown into confusion.
The Chairman of the Landlord Association of Omoniyi Quarters, Mr Ojo Oluwatayo, with other landlords in the area rushed to the Divisional Police Station in Ijapo to report the matter.
The DPO, SP Jane Mbanefo, and other policemen mobilised to the scene. Sunday Vanguard gathered that the the bodies of the couple have been deposited at the state Specialist Hospital, Akure morgue for autopsy. Meanwhile, the family of the husband has pleaded with the police to release his corpse to them for burial since he was a Muslim.
Speaking with Sunday Vanguard, the uncle of late Jimoh, Baba Labaika, said, “We have reported to the Deji of Akure and we want to bury Jimoh in his house while his ex-wife will be buried elsewhere.
Ondo State police image maker, Wole Ogodo, confirmed the incident. He said a blood stained knife suspected to have been used by the late husband to kill the wife was recovered from the scene of crime.
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