Life for 23-year-old Oluchi Obi in the last three months has been one tough journey of suffering.
Obi, an Imo State indigene, just wanted
to make a living as a housemaid when she got lucky and got a job through
an agent in Ajah area of Lagos.
“All I needed to do was to take care of the household and the man’s three children,” she said.
Obi’s boss, 47-year-old Frank Ikoh, was
said to be ill at the time while his siblings were also on hand to take
care of him in the house.
They said they just needed the housemaid to take care of the children and other chores in the house.
But that seemingly simple job would
later land Obi in detention for 39 days on accusation that she had
murdered her boss with a poisoned apple barely one month after she got
to the house.
The late Ikoh, who lived with his
children in VGC, Ajah, was said to have separated from his wife, Nkechi
Nnadi, six years earlier.
The family lawyer said he was down with
an illness, which gave him recurrent headache even before Obi was
employed as a housemaid.
Obi also told Saturday PUNCH that apart from her, the man’s sister and brother were also living in the house and taking care of him.
But on December 28, Ikoh succumbed to his illness and passed away.
According to the family lawyer, Mr.
Courage Erhuen, on January 12, two weeks after Ikoh’s death, a team of
policemen with the deceased’s ex-wife in tow, invaded the house and shot
teargas into the compound “under the guise of effecting an arrest of a
suspect for the murder of our client.”
That day, Saturday PUNCH learnt
that Obi was arrested by the police, while the ex-wife allegedly
marched into Ikoh’s bedroom with the assistance of policemen and took
possession of a safe, which the family lawyer said contained Ikoh’s
personal effects and vital documents.
Obi said the day she was arrested, she had started preparing the children for school when the policemen came.
“Everywhere was filled with teargas.
Everybody, including the children and oga’s (Ikoh’s) siblings, was
coughing badly. So, we had to move out. I was shocked when the policemen
mentioned my name and said they were looking for me. They took me into
custody and the woman took her children away that day,” she said.
According to Obi, she was told when she
was locked up at the State Criminal Investigation Department that a
petition had been filed by Nkechi, who alleged that she was the one who
gave her ex-husband a poisoned apple before he died.
Obi said, “I had never seen her before
until that day. I was shocked and did not know why she would make such
an allegation against me when she had not even met me before.
“I told the police that I had never
brought apple to the house. Apart from that, the man had been sick
before I was employed. The man was not even the kind of a person who
collected anything to eat from people anyhow. How could he possibly have
collected apple from me?
“The woman told the police that somebody
must have given me the poisoned apple to feed to him. She told them
that the report she got was that the children even wanted to eat part of
the apple but that I refused. I don’t know what brought about those
lies.
“I told them all these, yet, they
detained me in their terrible cell for almost six weeks. They said until
they determined what really killed the man, they would not free me. I
was in the house with the man’s brother and sister and they all knew I
had nothing to do with his death, yet the police acted only on what the
woman told them.”
Erhuen, who is now representing Obi
along with the Ikoh family, said he was surprised that the police could
just arrest people based on an unfounded report from someone who has no
evidence of crime and lock the suspect up for six weeks.
While Obi was in custody at the SCID,
the report of the autopsy invalidating any claim of foul play in the
death of the man came out but yet, they did not release the young woman
until the intervention by a former NDDC director effected her release.
A copy of the result of the autopsy
conducted on the deceased’s body at the Lagos State University Teaching
Hospital, which was signed by one Dr. Mgbehoma Ikenna, showed the
primary cause of death as “acute left ventricular failure” while the
secondary cause was identified as “hypertensive heart disease”.
On January 28, the late Ikoh’s lawyer,
filed a petition at the office of the Assistant Inspector-General of
Police calling for the release of Obi and the personal property of the
late Ikoh carted away by the police on the orders of the wife. Again on
February 22, another petition was sent to the office of the Deputy
Commissioner of Police, SCID, Yaba.
Erhuen said no action was taken on the
issue on both times. Apart from demanding the release of the belongings
of Ikoh reportedly taken away, the lawyer is calling on police
authorities to take necessary action to remedy the untold hardship
brought against the lady as a result of the false accusation against
her.
“The police and the ex-wife openly
boasted that they were well connected within the corridors of power at
the police high command. When they invaded the house, the deceased’s
siblings and relatives tried to stop them from taking the man’s safe
away, but the police descended on them and beat them up,” he said.
Attempts to get hold of the deceased’s
ex-wife have been abortive as an individual who picked her phone when
our correspondent contacted said she did not know anyone by that name.
Meanwhile, the spokesperson for the
Lagos State Police Command, Dolapo Badmus, could not be reached for
comment as well as her phone line did not connect when our correspondent
called her.
Erhuen said he had approached the Lagos
State High Court, to seek the release of the personal properties of the
deceased taken away by the police. But the case has yet to be assigned
to a judge. He also said he would be demanding the sum of N10m as
compensation from the police for the unlawful detention of Obi.
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