ONITSHA RITUAL MURDER

…Student killed, heart missing, as Police begin probe

From EMMANUEL UZOR, Onitsha

The Anambra State Police Command is investigating the death of an 18-year-old boy whose decomposing body was found at Abate Drive, Ogbomanu, near Onitsha.

The body of Mr. Miracle Onwura, who was a student of Learning Field International School, 3-3 was discovered with a deep hole in his heart by residents in the early hours of yesterday in a deep well at Abatete Drive by Ogbomanu.

Though the police said the cause of death was still unknown, residents told our reporter that the incident was ritual killing because of the alleged deep hole in the deceased’s heart.

According to Miracle’s close friend who doesn’t want to be named, it was ritual killing, adding, “we discovered there was a deep hole in his heart and we suspected that his heart had been plucked out” Miracle who was living with his parents at No 1 Onwura Close, Housing Estate, Trans-Nkisi, went missing on Sunday June 30 after playing football with his friends.

He said: “We played football together with Miracle on Sunday, he told us he wanted to go and barb his hair, since that day, he never came back and his parents and friends started searching for him till today (yesterday) when his decomposing body was found in a deep pit with a hole in his heart”

According to him, Miracle was a nice boy, who had dreamt of becoming a great man and lamented that his life was cut short by evil men without any provocation.

“He was a nice and obedient boy, he was a student of Learning Field International School, one of the institutions where discipline is a virtue, it beats my imagination that Miracle could be so cruelly murdered and his body dumped to decompose, that was the highest cruelty meted to my best friend. I am suspecting his killers just collected his heart and dumped his lifeless body in a deep pit in another man’s plot of land,” he said.

Also speaking, Mr. Bethrand Ndubuisi, a welder, linked Miracle’s killing to the quest for politicians who are jostling for positions ahead of the 2014 elections in the state.

“Miracle was just an unlucky boy, I am sure he was killed by evil men who think bloodletting is the only way to acquire political power, with the hole in his heart, you don’t need anybody to tell you that his heart was all they needed and as soon as they were satisfied, they dumped his body in a pit where no one could ever discover it if not because it started smelling, nobody would have ever discovered it”

When asked if the deceased was a victim of those who wanted to harm his parents, Ndubuisi said, “I can’t really tell, I know his father is rich because he is the owner of the street they live but I can’t say for sure why Miracle was wasted if not for ritual purposes”

However, the Divisional Police Officer, (DPO) in charge of 3-3, CSP Ketong, said the police are still investigating the incident, noting that an autopsy will determine the cause of death. “We are still at the level of investigation, the cause of the death is not yet known.

The investigation is not going to be for the police alone, it involves medical experts and when that is completed, we will be able to determine the real cause of his death, but for now, we just discovered his body in a well,” Ketong said.

Meanwhile, the South-East Chairman, Campaign for Democracy (CD), Dede Uzor A Uzor, has called for full investigation into the incident.

sources: https://sunnewsonline.com/new/national/ritual-murder-in-onitsha/