A couple identified as Mr. Emmanuel Onyenweaku Nwankpa and Mrs. Happiness Emmanuel Onyenweaku Nwankpa from Umuokpulor Abayi in Osisioma Local Government Area of Abia State has been banished from the community for allegedly killing their stepson whose name was given as David Chiemena Onyenweaku.

They were publicly paraded naked by irate youths of the community before their banishment.

The body of the 25-year-old had been deposited in a morgue along Aba-Owerri road.

It was gathered that the couple buried the deceased stepson in a shallow grave within their compound without the knowledge of any member of the family.

The reporter who visited the family area reported that the compound was deserted.

Household items of the couple destroyed by the angry youths littered some of the rooms.

Some of the neighbours of the Onyenweaku family, including the traditional ruler of the community, His Royal Highness Eze Ugonna, refused to grant our correspondent audience and walked him out of the monarch’s office.

Some members of the community who, however, spoke to our correspondent said that the couple was banished from the community for allegedly killing the deceased over a landed property.

A source in the community said: “An account has it that the couple killed their stepson and buried him in a shallow grave and kept it secret until a friend of the deceased claimed that he came to him in a dream to narrate that he had died and that his father and stepmother were responsible for his death.

“The couple denied it, but when the said friend claimed that the deceased disclosed that he was buried in the compound, the irate youths lost their patience and were taken to a part of the compound where they exhumed the body of the deceased.

“Seeing how the deceased was buried, they went berserk, inflicting several bodily injuries on the couple and later paraded them round the community.

“They were forced to take the body of the deceased to the morgue.”

Another source who could not attribute the death of the deceased to the said property crisis claimed that the deceased was brought back home sick by a woman that was taking care of him.

The source disclosed that the couple was banished from the village by the youths.

The Police Public Relations Officer of Abia State Command, Geoffrey Ogbonna in a telephone interview said “There was no formal report of the incident to the Police. Nobody has gone to the police to report in order to give the Police a true account of what happened.

“But through information, the Police got to know about it. When they got to that place, everywhere was deserted.

“Police are making efforts to hear from the couple who are already banned from the community.

“However, the information Police have is that the two people allegedly murdered and buried the 25-year-old boy in a shallow grave in their compound outside the knowledge of any member of the family.

“The youths were said to have intercepted the couple while they were trying to escape from the village and forced them to exhume the body of the deceased and the corpse taken to the morgue.

“Another account has it that the deceased was a shoemaker in Ariaria International Market. That the father had him through his estranged wife.

“That he came and asked for an apartment in his father’s house.

“That the same youths who paraded the man and the wife were the people that prevailed on his father to give him a room in their apartment and the man reluctantly gave him one room.

“They said that Chiemena was sick and that he died of the sickness and they buried him in a shallow grave.

“It is only an investigation that will prove what actually transpired. And that is when you have been able to get the people who were banished from the community or one of the irate youths who disclosed this dastardly act because they have fled their community.” (The Nation)

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