Man beats 7-yr-old son to death for stealing

Punch reports that the 39-year-old Inimgba, a resident of Amadi-Ama area in Port Harcourt, the state capital, had accused the deceased identified as George, of stealing his N3,200 on Friday, May 19, 2017, and in trying to discipline him, he used a cutlass to inflict cuts on the victim after beating him up with a plank.

During the beating, the boy was said to have lost consciousness and was discovered dead the next day.

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It was further learned that Inimgba's wife who is George’s stepmother, Blessing, was also arrested by the police for failing to rescue the boy from his father.

The police report that Inimgba had wanted to conceal the death of his son and give him an hurried burial but for a carpenter who raised the alarm on sighting the injuries on the boy.

Inimgba, popularly known as Oyinbo, was said to have invited the carpenter to his apartment to make a coffin for the burial of the child but when the carpenter saw the injuries on the body while measuring it, he raised an alarm leading to the arrest of the suspect and his wife.

Some neighbours and relatives of Inimgba who spoke to journalists said he had been in the habit of maltreating the boy since he sent his mother packing six years ago and got married to another woman.

His elder brother's wife who identified herself as K.K., said George requested water at the point of death, but the father continued the beating.

She said the boy’s attempts to explain that he used part of the money to feed himself because he was hungry fell on deaf ears.

“He beat the boy for about two hours. My husband was not around. The boy was crying and saying, ‘Daddy, give me water, I cannot walk again.’

The boy was saying ‘Sorry Daddy’ and the man continued to ask, ‘Where is the money?’ But the boy said he was hungry and used the money to buy bread.

He accused the son of stealing N3,200 from him over time. The boy was always hungry and if he came to my house to eat, the stepmother would report him to the father.

He went to his church to tell the pastor that his child was dead without explaining what led to the little boy’s death. It was when the carpenter raised the alarm that the neighbours knew that he had killed his son.

There were machete cuts on George’s body. Some angry boys came out and gave Oyinbo the beating of his life before a team of mobile policemen arrested him and his wife.”

A neighbour of the Inimgba's narrated that he was arrested last year he burnt George’s hand in the stove.

“He was arrested, detained for three days and was made to write an undertaking. It was at that point that the boy started going to school for the first time.”

A psychologist based in Port Harcourt, Sri George, who first shared the story on Instagram, said he had met with the late George on the street a few days before his death as people gathered around him after he was caught stealing a snack on his way to school.

George had earlier written:

“What a cruel world. Last Tuesday, between the hours of 8 am to 9 am, I saw a crowd of people around my vicinity gathered around this little boy. So, I stopped by and inquired what happened.

They told me that this little boy on his way to school stole a doughnut from a shop. The people whom he stole the doughnut from even gave him more of it and a bottle of drink and asked him to go.

They all claimed that his father and stepmother have the habit of starving and beating him up on a daily basis. I saw so many scars on his body.

I took the boy to my house, interviewed him, and he told me how he had been suffering since his mother left his father.

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I gave him some biscuits, asked him to come and eat at my place anytime and promised to see his father this week before he left for school, only to learn this morning (Saturday) that his father has beaten him to death.”

The State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), DSP Nnamdi Omoni, has confirmed the incident and said the matter was being investigated, adding that the man and the wife were in police custody.