At Kugbani village, an agrarian settlement located near Banda along Lokoja-Abuja road in Lokoja local government area of Kogi State, a spiritualist allegedly murdered two brothers in cold blood.
The peaceful community was thrown into confusion following the discovery and exhumation of remains of two brothers killed and buried in a shallow grave by a self-acclaimed spiritualist called Malam Ibrahim Mohammed.
It was gathered that the victims, Muhammed Kudu Abubakar and Umar Tanko Abubakar, who hailed from Bida local government area of Niger State, had visited the spiritualist for some spiritual assistance to boost their business. They were said to have left their family house on January 10, 2016 but never returned, a situation which forced their family members to go all-out in search for them.
A family member of the deceased victims, one Muhammed Abubakar reported the matter to the Kogi Police Command on February 2, 2016 and investigations were launched into the incident. The complainant had told the police that their findings showed that the last cell phone line that communicated with the deceased was from one Malam Ibrahim and that the call terminated at Karara village near Lokoja.
Following the complaints, a team of detectives from the State Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) led by its Commander, DSP Oluwadare Ayeni, swung into action and based on forensic reports through call-tracking, the spiritualist was picked up. During interrogation, the suspect, Malam Mohammed confessed that the duo came to him on January 10, 2016 for ritual sacrifice and that in the process, he prepared a poisonous concoction for them which they drank, and died. He also confessed that he dug a shallow grave in his compound where he buried the victims.
It was further gathered that the spiritualist killed the two brothers who had come to complain to him over the ineffectiveness of the earlier potion he had given them at huge cost. The fraudster then decided to kill the brothers, by giving them a poisonous concoction on pretext that it was meant to cleanse them from ill-luck.
The team of SARS operatives which exhumed the remains of the victims from the suspect’s compound at Kugbani village discovered that the suspect used a pestle to smash his victims on their heads before burying them. The team also discovered that the suspect upon killing them, took away their red Toyota Camry car to Lokoja, where he reportedly repainted it gold.
The suspect is currently under interrogation at the Kogi Police Command just as the State Commissioner of Police, Besan Gwana has assured he will be charged to court.