Slain mother of three, family cry out for justice
The family of late Sherifat Bello, the 31 year old mother of three who was murdered and chopped into pieces by her husband Shakiru Bello 36, have called for stiff punishment for the suspect.
It had been reported that Shakiru who had been divorced from the deceased for about a year now had on the 13th February 2017 called late Sherifat to come and see him at an unknown location where he had perfected his plan.
Neighbour of the deceased who identified herself as Mama Aisha had told our correspondent that all she could remember about the said day the deceased was last seen was that she had seen her receiving a call that morning and late Sherifat responding ‘she was coming’.
Younger sister of the deceased who spoke for the family, Shakirat Okoshebikun said, My sister had been through a lot in the hands of her husband. She has been the bread winner of the family as far as I can remember. She once bought a bike, a bus and even a private car for her husband all in the name of helping him to stand as a man.
” She wanted to make him happy. The reason why my sister had to divorce him was because he had in the past used a charm on her. He had inserted it in her private part which caused her ill health, but thank God for His Mercies, her life was spared.
” He even moved out of the house and the marriage was dissolved. I am yet to understand what he even you my sister that made her go all the way to meet with him again and now the ugly end. It is obvious he wanted to use her for money ritual. All my family wants is justice, he must be punished for his action.”
On his part, the suspect claimed it was a case of accident. He narratwa his own side of the story.
“I had actually called the mother of my children on that day because I had missed her, we both went to the Island to see a friend. On our way back, we bothered a bike to shomolu. While on third mainland bridge, a vehicle had hit us and ran away.
” we managed to get to where I was staying at Shomolu that night and she kept complaining of pains. I didn’t have enough money to take her to the hospital, so I kept telling her sorry thinking she would get better.
“Unfortunately she died that night. Out of fear of not knowing what her family would say and the pain of what I have been through in the hand s of her family, I had to cut off her head, hands, legs and other parts and buried them in different parts of an uncompleted building in our area so as not to be suspected of her death. I didn’t have plans of using her for rituals.”
However a police source at the SCIID had confided in our correspondent saying it was a clear case of murder as the explanation of the suspected didn’t hold water. The source said, ” when Shakiru was called as to the sudden disappearance of his late wife, he jus told them that the last he saw her was in that day when they had been involved in an accident and she had told him she was going back home.”
The family also claimed that they had requested to see the suspect but he had given them a fake address in Ibadan.
The Area B police command where the case was reported had however launched a man hunt for the suspect who was arrested on Friday 17th February 2017, and upon interrogation he had led policemen to the location where he had buried the body parts of the deceased.
