PUNCH
The Akwa Ibom State High Court sitting in Uyo has sentenced to death three women who kidnapped three children in Uyo and sold them off in Aba, Abia State for N1.1m.
The convicts – one Enobong Nsikak Sunday, 38; Getrude Thompson Akpan, 48; and Mary Okon James, 49 years old, were sentenced to death by Justice Gabriel Ette after finding them guilty of the offence of conspiracy and kidnapping which is punishable by death under Section 1 of the Akwa Ibom State Internal Security and Enforcement Law, 2009.
Nsikak Sunday, a mother of two who hails from Atiamkpat in Nsit Ubium Local Government Area, was found guilty of kidnapping a girl she met at a vigil in Ifa Atai, Uyo, “looking poor and hungry.”
Sending confessed to have trailed the mother and the child to their house in Ifa Atai from where she deceived the mother of the need to take the child to a hospital for treatment.
On the way, she said she stopped and gave the mother N5,000 to buy foodstuffs at the nearby Transformer Junction Market on Abak Road, Uyo, but she refused.
Like an eagle on the prowl, the convict said she returned to the woman’s house in Ifa Atai, after the first failed attempt, where she successfully kidnapped the unsuspecting child.
The second convict, Getrude Akpan, a native of Ikot Eyo in Nsit Ubium Local Government Area told the court that she made a profit of N500,000 per child she kidnaps, and N200,000 for those brought to her for sale.
Akpan was found guilty of kidnapping two children, aged two years and 10 months whom she kidnapped on 16th December, 2018 at Abak Road, Uyo, after deceiving their mother that the wife of the immediate past Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Dr. Martha Udom Emmanuel was empowering the poor and that she was willing take her to the First Lady for help.
