Man to die by hanging for stabbing colleague to death

An Abeokuta High Court has sentenced a 24- year old man, Monday Abbah to death by hanging for killing his colleague Mr Raphael Osugbe.

Abbah, who pleaded not guilty to the charge, was convicted on a one-count charge of murder.

Justice O.O Stanley, in her judgment on Friday, found Abbah culpable of the charge of murder, saying that the prosecution proved its case beyond reasonable doubts.

She convicted Abbah, saying that the evidence presented by the prosecution was tenable and therefore, sentenced Abbah to death by hanging.

“I hereby sentence you Monday Abbah to death by hanging until you are dead. May God have mercy on you” she said.

According to her, his action does not establish self-defence.

She held that no circumstance justified his action of stabbing his victim with knife, noting that it was a physical fight and the deceased was not armed with any dangerous weapon during the fight.

“It is very unfortunate that anger caused this, I think we have all learnt from this,” she said.

The prosecution had told the court that the convict committed the offence on Feb. 13, 2017 at Lexis Plastic Company along Lagos/Ibadan Expressway.

The prosecution said both the defendant and the deceased were staff of the Lexis Plastic Company, while the convict worked as a labourer, the deceased, Osugbe, was a truck driver.

“On Feb. 13, 2017, the company’s truck, which was driven by Mr Raphael Osugbe (deceased) wanted to offload goods, while he was reversing, the truck climbed some empty containers which were inside a sack that the defendant was arranging. The defendant took one of the empty container and threw it at Osugbe (the deceased), who angrily came down from his truck, held the defendant and also slapped him, which led to a physical fight.

“In the process, Abbah who was holding a knife he used to remove nylon from the plastic container, stabbed Osugbe in his neck and blood started gushing out

“The deceased was immediately rushed to the hospital but unfortunately died on the way due to shortage of blood,” said the prosecution.