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By Maduka Nweke
A pathologist, Dr Sokunle Soyemi, has disclosed that five deceased victims of the 21-storey building, which collapsed on November 1, 2021, at Gerard Road, Ikoyi, Lagos, are yet to be identified.
Soyemi, who is the acting Chief Medical Examiner of Lagos State, said this while testifying at an Ikeja Coroner’s Court on Thursday.
The pathologist, in his testimony, said there were 50 victims of the collapsed building (47 males and three females); 45 have so far been identified and their ages range from 18 to 56-years.
Soyemi said autopsies on the bodies commenced on November 4, 2021 and lasted for 13 days until November 13, 2021.
Revealing the causes of death, he said, “so far we have identified 45 bodies out of 50. The autopsies revealed that 40 deceased had multiple injuries as cause of death.
“Six had injuries to the head alone and died. One had bilateral fracture of the femure.”
The pathologist said the remains were put in 53 body bags because an additional three body bags had contained body parts of the deceased victims.
On the physical state of the corpses, the pathologist said the bodies could not be visually identified and samples had to be taken from the bodies for testing at the Lagos State DNA and Forensic Centre.
“After about a month, we started receiving results from the laboratory. As we were receiving the results, we were also releasing the bodies to families.”
