A prosecution witness, yesterday, gave graphic detail of last year’s gruesome killing of Lagos lawyer, Symphorosa Otike-Odibi, by his lawyer wife, Udeme, before an Igbosere High Court, Lagos.
The witness, Olusegun Bamidele, an Assistant Superintendent of Police in the Homicide Section, State Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Panti, told the court that Udeme, in her statement, confessed to killing her husband and cutting his manhood.
Udeme was arraigned on June 13, 2018 on a two-count charge of murder and misconduct with regard to a corpse by Lagos State Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Titilayo Shitta-Bey.
According to the prosecutor, Udeme stabbed Symphorosa, also a lawyer, to death and mutilated his corpse by cutting off his genitals on May 3, 2018, at their Diamond Estate, Sangotedo, Lekki, Lagos home.
The prosecutor said the offences contravened Sections 165 (b) and 223 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.
Udeme pleaded not guilty and was remanded in prison custody.
At the resumed hearing on Wednesday, the prosecutor called Bamidele, a police veteran, as the state’s final witness.
Bamidele told the court that as the head of a team that investigated the killing, he personally recorded the defendant’s statement.
He said that Udeme wrote a detailed confessional statement during an interactive session with her in protective custody in the police hospital.
According to him, the defendant was recuperating from what doctors described as “superficial and self-inflicted wounds,” when she made her statement.
He said the defendant spoke freely after identifying herself as a lawyer.
Bamidele said: “While she (Udeme) was writing her statement, it was an interactive session. I put questions to her, she would explain it to me and put it down in writing.
“She stated in her statement that she was married to the late Symphorosa and that they were having marital issues.
“She stated that the deceased was having extra-marital affairs and whenever she raised the issue with him, his responses were not satisfactory, he appeared nonchalant.
“She said that on May 2, 2018, she was preparing to travel to United Kingdom when she checked the bedside locker for her marriage certificate. When she could not find it, she went to the deceased where he lay on the bed and asked him about it but the response given was not okay.
“She had a discussion with him and there was hot exchange of words, which made her to go to the kitchen and get a frying pan and knife.
“When she returned to where the deceased lay, she hit him on the head with the frying pan and said ‘Tell me, what is in your mind that you are withholding.
“She stated that the deceased called his mother to report her conduct. She continued to hit the deceased on the head again and again. Finally, she confirmed that she used the knife to stab the deceased in his abdomen.”
But when the prosecutor sought to tender the two statements which Udeme allegedly made to the police, her counsel, Olusegun Banjoko, opposed the admissibility of the statements.
Banjoko prayed the court not to admit the statements as evidence, adding that they were not made in the presence of the defendant’s lawyer as required by law.
Justice Adedayo Akintoye adjourned until February 25 to consider the admissibility of the statements in a trial within trial.
