A High Court sitting in Abeokuta, Ogun State on Friday convicted and sentenced one 24-year-old man simply identified as Monday Abbah to death by hanging for the murder of his coworker, Mr Rapheal Osugbe.
The prosecutor’s counsel informed the court that Abbah committed the crime on Tuesday, February 13, 2017, at Lexis Plastic Company on the Lagos/Ibadan Expressway.
The prosecution said that both the defendant and the deceased were employees of the Lexis Plastic Company, with the convict working as a labourer and the deceased, Osugbe, as a truck driver.
“On Feb. 13, 2017, the company’s truck, which was driven by Mr Rapheal Osugbe (deceased), wanted to offload goods; while he was reversing, the truck mounted on some empty containers which were inside a sack that the defendant was arranging.
“The defendant took one of the empty containers and threw it at Osugbe (deceased), who angrily came down from his truck, held onto the defendant and also slapped him, which led to a physical fight.
“In the process, Abbah who was holding on to a knife he uses 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.
The prosecution added that the offence violated sections 316 and 319 of the Criminal Code, laws of Ogun 2006.
However, Abbah, who had pled not guilty, was found guilty of one count of murder.
On Friday, Justice O.O Stanley in her decision, ruled Abbah guilty of murder, adding that the prosecution established its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
She convicted Abbah, noting that the evidence offered by the prosecution was tenable, and condemned him 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 actions do not constitute self-defence.
She said that no circumstances warranted his action of stabbing his victim with a knife “because 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.
