A Bayelsan, Zikeme Ideisy and his wife, Eunice Ideisy, have been detained by the state police command for allegedly killing their seven-year-old son.
The boy’s father, Joshua and his stepmother, Eunice, allegedly conspired to torture him to death over allegations of involving in witchcraft.
The couple, had reportedly taken Joshua from his grandmother, whom he had been living with since he was a baby.
The source said they later accused him of being a wizard and started inflicitng injuries on him.
The suspects took Joshua to the Federal Medical Centre, Yenagoa, on Sunday after inflicting injuries on him.
He was said to have sustained multiple injuries all over his body during what appeared like a routine torture. He finally died at the Children ward in the hospital
The hospital management was said to have confirmed him dead and referred the case to the police at the Azikoro division, Yenagoa.
The two suspects were subsequently whisked away by the policemen, who detained them for interrogation.
“The boy was living with his grandmother before the man brought him to live with them. That was in November 2016.
“When they brought the child home, he didn’t have any torture mark. It was within a few weeks that the boy stayed with them that the incident happened. He was beaten to death by the two of them over allegation that he was into witchcraft,” a family source said.
The FMC’s Public spokesman, Ben Akpedi, confirmed that the child was brought to the hospital.
He said efforts by the hospital to make the suspects talk were abortive.
He said, “The boy’s father and a lady, who claimed to be the stepmother, brought him to the hospital yesterday (Sunday). On a close examination, our doctors found out that the child had passed on. There were a lot of bruises on him. We decided to conduct quick investigation and ask them some questions. But somehow, their answers were phoney.
“When we asked where they brought the child from, they said they came from across the bridge. We asked for their house address, they were not specific. We asked for a telephone number, but the number they gave us didn’t go through. In their statements, they didn’t say they were the ones that tortured the boy.
“We decided not to go further. We invited the security agents so that whatever might have happened to the child could be ascertained.
“The unfortunate thing is that the couple appeared to be young. Both of them are now with the police at the Azikoro division,” he said.
