UMOREN: Female witness reveals how Akpan lured, drugged, raped her

A female witness has testified against Uduak Akpan, an alleged murderous rapist, whom she claimed drugged and raped her in his Uyo house where he invited her for employment on December 5, 2020.

The witness, whose identity the court shielded, narrated how Mr Akpan lured her to his house.

According to her, she arrived at Akpan’s house in Uruan Local Government Area by 5 p.m. and left around 1 a.m.

“He said that in the farm, they deal on drugs and that the government knows about it, and before he employs anybody, he has to test the drugs on the person. I pleaded with him but he said that if the drug was too much on me, that there is a tonic water that he will give me to drink to flush the drug out of my system.

“I was really begging him and he said if I wanted to go, I have to do as he said. He said I should stand up immediately and take the drugs.

“He brought out three wraps of marijuana from his pocket. He lit two. He gave me one and showed me how to inhale it, while he was smoking one. I smoked the first one, nothing happened to me.

“He lit the second one and was taking me round the compound and asking me if I could still recognise what was in front of me. I said yes.

“He gave me the second one, and still nothing happened to me. He told me that I needed to help him, that he was high and needed to release. I started crying and begged him. But after, I removed my trouser and he raped me,” she said.

She said Mr Akpan later forced her to undress and photographed her nakedness.

“I was begging him to let me go. He now said I should undress totally. He took out his phone and snapped pictures of me naked. After that, he said I should wait, that he would call a bike to come and pick me up,” she added.

Akpan threatened to kill her if she told anyone.

Her testimony followed that of Samuel Udo, the police officer investigating how Akpan killed his second victim Iniubong Umoren, a graduate looking for a job in Uyo, Akwa Ibom.

Udo accused Akpan of raping the victim before killing her in April.

The officer told the State High Court that Akpan had confessed that he (Akpan) hit late Miss Umoren with a stabilizer before she fell down and died.

He tendered a compact disk containing a video recording the police did during the exhumation of Miss Umoren’s body where it was buried in a shallow grave allegedly by Mr Akpan.

The video was aired in court on Thursday.

The police inspector said it was Akpan who led the police to the grave and was present during the exhumation.

“I recovered the stabilizer that he confessed he used. When we exhumed the remains of the deceased, there was an open wound on the forehead of the deceased and a mark of injury on the lower abdomen,” he said.

He said the case was first reported as an abduction but following the arrest of the suspect and his confessional statement, the police established a murder case.

The case was adjourned to January 14, 2022.