Akwa Ibom State High Court sitting in Essien Udim on Wednesday, sentenced two brothers to death for killing a farmer over a parcel of land.
The convicted murderers are; 48 year-old pastor and motorcyclist, Uduak Udo Umoren, and Emmanuel Udo Umoren, a 34 year-old farmer and panel beater both indigenes of Adiasim Ikot Ekon Village in Essien Udim Local Government Area.
They were condemned for the murder of a 45 year-old farmer and a trader, Iboro Akpan Joe, from Ikot Otu also in Essien Udim, when he visited his sister in-law in Adiasim Ikot Ekon to condole her on the death of her husband.
The sister in-law had asked the deceased to accompany her to her late husband’s farmland to assess how much she could sell it for his burial.
It was gathered that, while on the land, the wife of the second convict saw them and called her husband informing him that someone was trying to bury juju on their family land.
On getting to the farmland, the second convict beat the deceased, while his wife also invited her son and her brother in-law who joined in beating the deceased with machete and stabbed him with broken bottles.
However, the presiding judge, Justice Winifred Effiong, in her judgment, found the two accused guilty of murder and sentenced them to death by hanging.
She said the prosecution team from the State Ministry of Justice had proven its case beyond reasonable doubt that the accused did intentionally kill the deceased.
