Court Remands Lagos Couple Over Alleged Murder

An Ebute-Metta Magistrates’ Court, Lagos, has ordered the remand of three defendants at the correctional centre following a murder charge preferred against them by the police.

The defendants are: Sunday Sojunu, 35, his wife, Toyin, 31, and an alleged accomplice, Dare Sampson, 32.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the defendants were charged on three counts, bordering on the alleged murder of a 45-year-old man, Mr Ayoola Bello, at the Ikorodu area of the state.

The charges were read before the court, but the pleas of the defendants were not taken.
Magistrate Mrs O. O Adeosun ordered that the male defendants be remanded at the Ikoyi facility while the female defendant be remanded at the KiriKiri Correctional Facility pending legal advice.
The court, consequently, directed that the case file be forwarded to the director of public prosecutions (DPP) for advice.

She adjourned the case until January 21, 2026.

In the charge, the prosecutor, ASP Kehinde Olatunde, alleged that the defendants were apprehended on December 8 for their roles in the crime.

“Toyin, a TikTok content creator, met the deceased, Mr Ayoola Bello, on a social media platform, and both became friends and were eager to meet physically.

“On September 15, pretending to her husband about her journey to Cotonou, Benin Republic, Toyin travelled straight to Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, on a visit to the deceased, where she spent two days with him at an undisclosed local hotel in Ijebu-Ode.

“Thereafter, the couple allegedly fell critically ill, and they could not find a remedy to their unabated ailment, said to have been caused by the wife’s infidelity.

“She later openly confessed to her husband that she cheated on him by sleeping with her lover, and sought forgiveness, which she thought would alleviate their illness,” he said.

The prosecutor said that the husband mounted pressure on the wife to lure the deceased down to their house in Ikorodu.

“Before then, the husband had hired the accomplice, a notorious cultist and hired killer, who had been on the police wanted list for some time, to assist him in killing the deceased.

“They held the man in captivity and collected N200,000 ransom from his family before they tied his hands and legs and tortured him.

“They forced him to take some shots of snipper, which he gulped to his death.

“His arms and legs were decimated and packed inside sacks separated from the body trunk, which was transported on a motorcycle to an isolated Adamo Junction, where the deceased body parts were dumped into the river,” he said.

The offences contravene the provisions of Sections 165, 222, and 233 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.

Section 222 prescribes the death penalty for murder upon conviction.