Ebonyi housewife sentenced to death by hanging for killing co-wife and her seven children

EBONYI housewife Agnes Nwefuru has been sentenced to death by the state high court sitting in Abakaliki by hanging for killing her co-wife and seven children in a fit of jealousy that wracked her polygamous home.

In a bizarre case and the first ever of its kind, Mrs Nwefuru was accused of setting ablaze the house of her co-wife, Felicia Nwefuru, which led to her death and that of her seven children. According to the police, the accused also burnt her own house during the evil act as a camouflage.

She removed all her belongings and that of her children and took them to a safe place outside the house before committing the act. In 2017, eight members of a family were burnt to death following a mysterious fire that engulfed their residential house around 3am at Ogboji community in the Ishielu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State.

Two persons were said to have survived the inferno which razed the two thatched houses in the compound, the husband, Mr Sylvanus Nwefuru and Miss Ukamaka Nwefuru, one of late Felicia’s daughters. Delivering the judgment, the presiding judge, Justice Uwabunkonye Onwosi, declared that the plaintiff proved that the defendant was guilty of the murder charge preferred against her.

He ruled: “Nwefuru Agnes is found guilty of murder and is hereby convicted. The term of her sentence is that she be hanged by neck until she is dead."