Another house help kills boss, mother in Lagos

A house help employed at the Surulere area of Lagos on June 16 knifed his female employer to death, and her mother, in shock watching the murder, collapsed and died too.

The killer domestic hand then picked phones and gadgets he considered valuable, packed them into his dead boss Camry, and zoomed off.

According to PPRO Bala Elkana in a statement Thursday, the suspect was arrested at a checkpoint later after the Surulere police station got an alert around 3 am, and officers on patrol were able to get him.

In his confession, Joseph Ogbu, 22, from Oju, Benue, said had an argument with Oreoluwa John around 9pm, and he just stabbed her. Her mother, 89, saw this, collapsed, and died right there.

“Considering the fact that they were dead, he moved some valuable properties such as electronics, handsets and household items into the employer’s Toyota Camry Salon Car and attempted to escape to where he could not be found, before he was apprehended by policemen on patrol at Ogunlana pin-down point. The vehicle and items stolen were recovered,” Said Elkana.

The crime scene was sealed off and that the corpses of the two victims were taken to Mainland Hospital, Yaba for autopsy.

Lagos State, CP Zubairu Muazu, had ordered the State Criminal Investigation Department, Yaba to take over the investigation and charge the suspect to court.

Early in the year, a house help in the Ikoyi area of the state also stabbed his boss, an ICT businessman, to death the very first day on the job.

The crime has been taking a similar patter—young domestic workers using knives to kill employers almost on resumption, and carting away whatever they can.