Posted by By Juliana Francis on
A woman in Ikeja area of Lagos, has been remanded in the Kirikiri prison for pouring hot water on her adopted son, for daring to put on the television set.
•For pouring hot water on kids
A woman in Ikeja area of Lagos, has been remanded in the Kirikiri prison for pouring hot water on her adopted son, for daring to put on the television set.
The children, Deborah and Wisdom Ezeh, were suspected by the Human Right desk in Area ‘F' police command to have, at different occasions, been maltreated by Jossy, their foster mother.
What, however, led the cat out of the bag and dragged Jossy into the police net and later in Kirikiri prison, was the pouring of hot water on a seven-year-old Wisdom. Further investigations revealed many scares on the victim. Asked the cause of a big scare on his head, Wisdom claimed Jossy used knife on him while 8 years old Deborah revealed that one of the scares on her head was inflicted on her by Jossy when she flogged her.
The suspect has revealed to police that Wisdom and Deborah are not her biological children. She claimed to have taken them from their father because of her Christian faith and because she wanted to show love by helping them.
The Investigating Police Officer (IPO) said: "She has no relationship with the children. She worships in the Redeemed Christian Church of God. She said she doesn't have time for evangelism because of her job but sometimes goes to visit inmates in prisons to make up for not evangelizing."
"According to her, she usually gave the inmates money or bought rice for them. It was there she met a girl, who was jailed for killing her mother. One day, the girl told her that instead of always giving her money, she would like her to go to her house and assist her younger ones."
Armed with the address, Jossy and her friend traced the house and discovered that the family was living in abject poverty. She claimed that her friend gave the family N40, 000, while she gave N5000. She further claimed that the children's father had implored her to take the children, as he believed they would receive better care, attention and education in her hands. They were said to have been with her for two years.
The woman, however, denied the claims of the little boy. According to her, the scar was an accident caused by a rascally girl. She claimed that Wisdom had bumped into the girl carrying down a pot of yam from the fire and the water which was used in boiling the yam poured on him. The victim was taken to the police station by the headmistress, after he came to school with burns that needed medical attention.
The police alerted a non-governmental organization, Project Alert, to take over the matter. It was the NGO that finally took the boy to the Ikeja General hospital. The children who looked unkempt, hungrily devoured the biscuits and gulped soft drinks placed in front of them by staff of the NGO. The children knew the suspect as Jossy or Emmanuella's mummy and are both pupils of Tokunbo Allie Nursery and Primary school in Ikeja.
Wisdom said: "Emmanuella mummy poured hot water on me. She said I put on the television. It was Jossy who boiled the water."
When Wisdom's teacher noticed the injuries after days of the boy's absence, he decided to find out what happened to him. They went to Jossy's home but the security man wouldn't allow them in. When Jossy learnt the teachers were aware, she quickly went to lodge a complaint at the police station against them. While in the company of some policemen, she allegedly assaulted one of the teachers. And when the NGO became involved, Jossy was detained. She, however, had somebody in an NGO who she told to come for her bail. But the NGO she went to was the one that usually fights for women. "Unfortunately, the NGO that was contacted for her bail was also the one that was fighting for justice on behalf of the children."
Though, Jossy refused to speak with journalists on the grounds that her lawyer forbade her from doing so. She was said to have told the police that: "On May, 28, I left home from the office and returned to meet Wisdom with the injuries." She said when she made inquiries, she was told that a girl came to her house in her absence and boiled yam and after removing it from the pot, Wisdom, who was picking beans that fell on the ground, got up and hit his head against the pot, tilting the contents of the pot which poured on him. Jossy described the 11-year-old girl as rascally and added that she never allowed her to come to her house. Jossy, however, put a spook in her story when she couldn't produce the girl and denied knowing where she lives or her parents.
She was arrested on June 8, and appeared before the Ikeja Magistrate court the next day. The magistrate was said to have taken time to examine the boy's body and given a stiff bail terms. The suspect was to produce two level 14 officers in the ministry, with landed properties and to pay the sum of N1million or be remanded in prison. She couldn't meet the terms and had been remanded in the Kirikiri prison. Meanwhile, Wisdom and his sister Deborah had been taken to the Little Saints Orphanage at the Palm Grove area of Lagos.