Mrs Ronke Shonde was found dead at her home in Egbeda on the morning of May 6, 2016 but the husband Lekan Shonde claims he only slapped her during a heated argument (read earlier reports here).
The family nanny had arrived to prepare the children for school and found the house locked. Looking through the window, she found Ronke’s children crying because they couldn’t get their mummy to wake up.
When the nanny forced the door open, she found that Ronke’s body showed signs that she had suffered domestic violence. Her husband, Lekan, was nowhere in sight and his phones were switched off.
When he finally spoke to Punch from hiding, he claimed he had nothing to do with his wife’s death, in spite of reports he had beaten her to death and was always in the habit of beating her at every slight provocation. He also accused her of constantly cheating on him and refusing to cook for him. He added that she was cheating on him with one Kayode, the general manager of a publishing company, and they had an argument about it the night before, but he claimed he didn’t beat her to death.
He also made a statement that shocked everyone who read it at the time.
He said: “I am a Lagos boy and I can be in this Lagos for the next 30 years and nobody would see me.”
He was said to have surrendered to the authorities five days later, after an extensive manhunt.
During the trial, the prosecution had alleged that Lekan Shonde committed the offence at 8.30 p.m. on May 5, 2016 at his residence at No. 3, Tiemo Close, Egbeda, near Lagos. But the body wasn’t discovered until the following day.
The Lagos State High Court found him guilty of murder and sentenced him on Friday, March 8, 2019.
Delivering the judgement, Justice Josephine Oyefeso sentenced Lekan to death by hanging based on the conviction that the convict killed his wife, Ronke.
