Man to die by hanging for murdering delivery agent
By Modupe Shodeinde
A man named Sodeinye Mbatumukeke, has been convicted and sentenced to death by a Rivers State High Court sitting in Port Harcourt, for murdering a Jumia delivery agent, Chukkwuma Eleji.
The Judge, I. P. Chigoezi-Igwe, on Monday, Feb 15, in Port Harcourt discharged and acquitted the second defendant in the case, Divine Naabe, of the murder and robbery charges, while Mbatumukeke was sentenced to death by hanging.
Mbatumukeke was arrested alongside his friends, Mr. Divine Excel Naabe and Miss Joy Eluwa for the murder of the delivery agent, Chukwuma Eleje who was reportedly killed after he delivered expensive smartphones, which the convict and his friends ordered online to their apartment in March 2017.
His body was recovered in a septic tank in the apartment on Ada-George Road in the Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of Rivers State on March 27, 2017.
The female suspect, Joy Eluwa, said to be the girlfriend of the convict, was released while the two male suspects went on trial.
Almost four years into the trial, Mbatumukeke was found guilty on two counts of murder and armed robbery.
The judge said that the prosecution team was able to prove their case and convinced the court that Mbatumukeke killed the Jumia agent.
He ruled that even though the convict was rejecting the confessional and extra-judicial statements he earlier made in the matter, the evidence provided was weighty enough to prove that he (Mbatumukeke) murdered the Jumia delivery agent.
Mbatumukeke was also found guilty of the second charge, armed robbery.
The judge sentenced him to death by hanging, noting that the sentence will serve as a deterrent to other criminal elements.
The second defendant, Divine Naabe, was however discharged and acquitted of murder and robbery charges, for the lack of suffiecient evidence to find him guilty of the crimes.
