A 23-year-old philosophy student at Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ayomide Adeleye, has confessed to the brutal murder of an 18-year-old church member, Christiana Idowu.
The chilling revelation was made while Adeleye was in custody at the Lagos State Police Command Tactical Unit in Ikeja, where he disclosed his motive as stemming from financial difficulties.
Reports revealed that Adeleye admitted to luring Idowu, who was an Industrial Training student at Yaba College of Technology, to his residence under the guise of helping her repair her phone.
He revealed, “I killed her because I had financial problems.”
Recounting the incident, Adeleye said that Idowu arrived at his home around 5 p.m. on the fateful day and asked for assistance with her phone. Seizing the opportunity, he made a sudden and deadly attack.
“I just grabbed her, applied pressure. She started struggling. She didn’t really shout because I already suppressed her. I then squeezed her throat, and she gave up,” he detailed.
After the murder, Adeleye proceeded with a grim plan to dispose of her body and extort money from her family.
He dug a shallow grave behind his compound and buried her body in the early hours of the next day.
“By 4 a.m. the following day, I woke up, I continued digging. Honestly, I did not close my eyes till daybreak,” he recounted, indicating the turmoil he experienced as he carried out the gruesome act.
In a cruel twist, Adeleye contacted Christiana’s mother, pretending to be a kidnapper and demanding a ransom for her release.
“The first thing I said to her was, ‘Hello, madam. we have your daughter,’” he stated. Despite demanding an initial sum of three million naira, he eventually settled for N360,000, knowing the family’s financial limitations.
“I knew for a fact that she didn’t have three million. Even if she did not have that amount, I was ready to collect any amount because I desperately needed money no matter the amount,” Adeleye confessed.
He directed the distraught mother to transfer the money to a SportyBet account in an attempt to avoid being traced. After receiving the N350,000, he requested an additional N10,000, claiming it was all the mother had left.
Adeleye’s downfall came when his SportyBet account was traced back to him due to his uploading of his National Identification Number.
“If I had not uploaded my NIN, it would just be an empty account,” he explained. He further revealed, “But the moment I uploaded my NIN, all my personal details, my location, my address, my name, everything, was already on the SportyBet. The girl’s phone was also with me; they could have traced the location of the phone, that was how they got my location.”
Expressing regret and acknowledging the gravity of his crime, Adeleye reflected on his actions. “I regret that I killed her because my mum and her mum were friends,” he said. He added, “I don’t deserve any mercy for what I have done. At the same time, I ask God to forgive me. What I did was totally wrong and I regret it.”
Adeleye disclosed that he had contemplated suicide due to the overwhelming guilt, noting, “I feel remorseful for what I have done. If there’s any way I could be given a second chance, I want to be given one but I deserve death, honestly. I have been planning to kill myself. While I was in the guard room, I tried to look for any sharp object to cut myself so that I would bleed to death.”
The case highlighted the tragic consequences of desperation and the devastating impact on families and communities when such heinous crimes are committed.
