Emma Nnadozie
Palpable anxiety has gripped residents of Okegbodo, a suburb of Ikorodu in Lagos state following reports that a 16-year-old apprentice was tortured to death inside a popular Celestial Church in their community.
In fact, members of the community now restrict the movement of their children and diligently monitor every activity going on in and around them after they alleged that killers of the apprentice are freely walking the streets after they were unceremoniously released by the police who arrested them few hours after the murder was discovered.
However, police sources said three suspects including the leader of the church have been arrested and detained while efforts are being made to locate where the boy was buried.
Crime Guard learnt that the events that led to the murder of the apprentice started on the 6th of May, 2020 at about 3pm.
A close neighbour to the Celestial Church gave a vivid account of what transpired in the area thus: “I was passing behind the Celestial church when I heard few people including men and women crying in deep pain saying Olorun Oshoffa (God of Oshofa) should help them.
“I was so curious to know what was really happening but was not able to make any meaning out of the strident cries for supplications for God’s intervention being rendered from the church.”
In the same vein, occupants of a six-block of flats behind the church also confirmed that they were hearing a boy begging for help to be freed from where he was tied.
“All of a sudden, we could not hear the anguished cries of the boy again. What we heard next was ‘“Olorun Oshoffa bami ji (God of Oshofa, wake him up), daddy where is your faith?, I must not be put to shame, somebody is dead, etc.”
On the 7th of May. 2020, a team of policemen from Imota police station came to arrest the leader of the Celestial Church.
People expected the police to come for proper investigation because stories circulated all over that somebody had been killed and buried in the premises of the church where the cries were coming from only to see that the man was released on 11th may 2020.
“Later, we ascertained from some members of the church who were around when the incident happened that their leader sent for the boy where he was learning tailoring at about 10:am and when the late boy came, he and two other men started interrogating him over N5,000 missing in the church.
The boy reportedly denied all the allegations against him and refused to succumb to threats during interrogation, prompting leaders of the church to subject him to torture after tying him on a tree inside the church.
“They allegedly used lit candle to burn his scrotum while trying to force him to admit being in possession of the money but the boy insisted that he was innocent.”
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