Crimes

Suspects: Why we killed ex-Benue judge

The suspected killers of the retired President of the Benue Customary Court of Appeal, Justice Margaret Igbetar, have confessed to having killed the jurist over family inheritance.

The decomposing body of Justice Igbetar was found with deep cuts on her back in her residence in Makurdi, the Benue State capital, on August 24, 2023.

Parading the suspects before newsmen on Tuesday, October 3, 2023, the Benue State Commissioner of Police, Bartholomew Onyeka, disclosed that after the former judge’s gruesome murder, the police arrested her nephew, Joseph Aondohemba.

Aondohemba, while speaking to journalists during the parade, said the deceased had his father’s landed property.

She said: “She (Justice Igbetar) was my aunt and she had the documents of my father’s landed property and when we asked her, she was not forthcoming about it.

“So, I had to arrange with others, meanwhile I was not the one who stabbed her, it was Dzungwenen Ukor.”

Ukor, who was also paraded by the police, confirmed stabbing the late judge.

The suspect added that Aondohemba asked him to stab her because she refused to release the documents of his father’s property he said was in her possession.

“He asked me to stab her and I did that because he had accused the woman of withholding documents of his father’s landed property,” he said.

Speaking earlier, the police commissioner said: “The suspect (Aondohemba) confessed to having planned and recruited other people to help him to kill his aunty and led a team of detectives to Adikpo in Kwande Local Government Area where two others were arrested.

“The two arrested at Adikpo were Igbazenda Gbidye (63) and Dzungwenen Ukor (40).

“These suspects admitted that Aondohemba reported to them that his father died and left a lot of property in the hands of his aunty (the deceased) and she had refused to hand the said property over to him.

“They agreed to join him in eliminating her so he could have access to his property.

“One Akuhwa Barnabas (32), driver to the deceased, corroborated their statements and admitted that he gave the gang access to the house and manned the gate until they finished the assassination process.”

Onyeka added that the four suspects would be arraigned after the completion of the investigation.

Onyeka also told newsmen that between July and September, Benue State Police Command arrested 85 persons in connection with kidnapping, armed robbery, culpable homicide, cultism, rape, and unlawful possession of firearms.

He disclosed that the police recovered 12 locally-made pistols, four AK-47 riffles, four single and double-barrel guns, 160 ammunition, and four cartridges during the period.

Onyeka assured that police would soon secure the release of the Benue Commissioner for Information, Culture and Tourism, Mathew Abo, who was recently kidnapped by gunmen.

The Star