The Ondo Police Command has arraigned five suspected killers of the 25-year-old Uber driver, Temitope Olorunfemi, before an Akure Chief Magistrate Court, for murder and arson.
The suspects are Victor Amos, 30; Ismalia, 32; Pelumi Farotimi, 42; Nurudeen Kumuyi, 22, and Samuel Olatunji, 23.
The accused persons were charged on three counts of felony, unlawful murder and arson.
Police prosecutor, Inspector Nelson Akintimehin, said that the accused persons and others at large committed the offence on April 10 at about 9p.m., opposite Odopo Town Hall, along Ijoka Road, Akure.
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Akintimehin informed the court that the accused conspired to commit felony and unlawful murder of the deceased, Temitope.
He said that the accused persons were alleged to have murdered the deceased in cold blood with sticks, stones and other offensive weapons.
According to the prosecutor, the accused also maliciously damaged one Toyota Camry car with number plates KRD 627 GY, by setting it ablaze.
The offences, Akintimehin said, contravene Sections 324, 316(1) and 451(6)(J) of the Criminals Code, Cap 37 Vol. 2 Laws of Ondo State.
The court did not take the pleas of the defendants for lack of jurisdiction.
The prosecutor, through a written application, urged the court to remand the defendant at the Olokuta Correctional Centre pending the issuance of advice from the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions(DPP).
Responding, the defence team led by O. Agbede, asked the court for an adjournment to enable each defendant file a counter-affidavit to the application sought by the prosecutor.
The trial Chief Magistrate, Musa Al-Yunus, thereafter, granted the requests of the defence lawyers and adjourned the case till April 27 for reply to the affidavit and ruling.
Al-Yunus ordered that the defendants should still be remanded in the police custody till next date of adjournment.
Recall that Temitope was gruesomely lynched by irate mob after his vehicle crushed four persons to death along Ijoka area of Akure, Ondo State capital, on Easter Monday.
The mob allegedly stoned him to death after they reportedly found some fetish items in his vehicle.
But his family members have denied that he was a ‘yahoo boy’ as alleged by his killers.
The mother, Madam Mojisola, and the wife, Mosunmola, said that the deceased was a Uber driver in Lagos and that the piggy bank and other ladies items found in his vehicle before it was set ablaze belonged to his wife.
The state police command had, last week, paraded four principal suspected killers of the deceased.
Spokesperson of the command, Funmi Odunlami, said that seven suspects have been arrested and that others on the run would soon be apprehended.
Vanguard
