I killed my lover out of self-defence, cries 20-year-old lady

A 20-year-old lady, who stabbed her live-in-lover to death at the Ajegunle area of Lagos State has confessed that she did it out of self-defence.

The suspect, Gift Wahab, said she picked the kitchen knife just to threaten and scare her lover, Ebi, 24-year-old from further hitting her, but rather than keep away, the man had continued pounding her until the knife mistakenly embedded into his neck. The incident which occurred on March 19, 2-15, led to the deceased bleeding to death.

Trouble between the lovers started after Wahab told the deceased that she was hungry, but he told her to go and drinkgarri.

The two had soon started quarreling, resulting in Ebi repeatedly hitting Wahab. Apparently filled with impotent anger, the suspect dashed and picked a kitchen. She used it to stab the deceased on the neck.

Wahab said: “Since I couldn't over power him, I sought to defend myself. I rushed to pick a knife to prevent him from coming closer to hit me. But he continued coming towards me. It was in the process of dragging with him, that the knife mistakenly got him on the neck. He started bleeding."
The suspect, who started living with Ebi since she was 18, insisted that she never meant to kill him. She said that the two of them were not just live-in-lovers, but had plans to marry. She added that they once had a baby who died few months after her birth.

The couple met in 2013 in a night club and since then became lovers. She said she was confused when it dawned on her that she had stabbed Ebi. She started screaming until neighbours came. Ebi was rushed to the hospital, but died on the way.

Policemen from Layeni Police Station whisked Wahab away for interrogation. She was later transferred to the State Criminal Investigations Department (SCID), Panti, Yaba, Lagos State, for further investigation.

A police source said: “The suspect confessed that she wasn't in her real sense when she killed the man.”

Wahab said: “I dropped out of school in SS2, after I lost my father. We were four kids. My mother alone couldn’t cope with the four of us. I started going to night clubs with friends. I met Ebi in 2013 in one of the night clubs I used to frequent. We started interacting and later fell in love. We started dating.”

Wahab, who described Ebi, simply as a businessman, added that Ebi took her to present to his family members as his future wife and she also did the same.
“I got pregnant for him and in December 2014, I gave birth to a baby girl. But the baby died later same month and year,” said Wahab. “We were still going out as usual until on March 19, 2015, after we got back from clubbing. I told him he should give me the key to the house, so that I could go in, especially since I was hungry. But he refused to hearken to my words, neither did he gave me money to eat. Rather, he said I should go and drink garri that night and go to bed. I didn't utter a word until he started raising issues which led to our quarrel and soon he began to punch me.”