Two gay suspects identified as Ayomide Oluwole and James Williams, who had escaped jungle justice in Lagos State, were however unlucky as one of the latter met his waterloo in the hands of irate youth in Jaba Local Government Area of Kaduna State.
The death of Williams, 38, created panic and heightened communal tension in the quiet Jaba community.
Trouble started for the gay lovers when in January 2011, Oluwole met James Williams, who had returned from America and got engaged in a homosexual relationship, an offence punishable by the Nigerian law.
It was learnt that Oluwole and Williams were said to have been attacked by some gang of youths in Alausa area of Lagos. They accused them of sodomy. They were beaten, stripped naked and paraded before a large crowd at a market square before they were handed over to men of the Nigeria Police Force.
They were detained at the police station for three months before they were eventually released on bail in November 2011 afterwhich they fled to Kaduna State.
While in Kaduna Statte, they continued with their homosexual behaviour, but luck, however, ran out on them when on December 11, 2013, as they were again caught in Kwoi area of Jaba local government area of Kaduna State by some Muslims and community youths who manhandled them and in the process killed Williams.
According to an eyewitness, Mr Matthew Felix, the Chief Priest of the Kwoi community shrine, said Mr. Ayomide was dragged before him at the midnight at about 12am by the youth leaders and other people of the Kwoi community to face the consequences of his alleged crime and he ordered that he should be locked in the shrine room until the next morning.
“The next morning at about 7am, we noticed that Mr Oluwole is not in the shrine where he was locked, he was no longer there. He escaped through the window into the forest. Youths of Kwoi community embarked a search mission and combed the bush but he was nowhere to be found,” Feliix stated.
Recall that in 2014, former President Goodluck Jonathan government criminalised same-sex union by signing the prohibition Bill into law, prescribing 14 years imprisonment for offenders.
Human Rights Watch had strongly kicked against the law, defending gays and their rights.
Meanwhile, Police authorities have launched a manhunt for for Ayomide Oluwole in a bid to ensure he face the full wrath of the law.
