A Kwara State High Court sitting in Ilorin has sentenced Abdulrahman Bello to death by hanging for the murder of Hafsoh Lawal, a 24-year-old final-year student of the Kwara State College of Education, Ilorin.
Delivering judgment on Thursday, Justice Hannah Olushola Ajayi found Bello guilty after four months of trial.
Meanwhile, four co-defendants—Ahmed Abdulwasiu (41), Suleiman Muyideen (28), Jamiu Uthman (29), and Abdulrahmon Jamiu (31)—were discharged and acquitted by the court.
At the start of the trial, Bello admitted to killing Hafsoh Lawal, who he met on Facebook, for money rituals.
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He described himself as an Islamic cleric and told the court he acted alone. Bello, who said he killed Lawal because he needed human hands for money rituals, regretted that if only he knew another way to source the needed ingredient, he wouldn’t have killed her.
According to court proceedings, Hafsoh was attending a naming ceremony on February 13, 2025, when Bello invited her to his home near the Offa garage area in Ilorin.
During the trial, Bello provided varying accounts of what happened. In one version, he told the court that he had sex with Hafsoh, strangled her, and then dismembered her body. ‘In another, he claimed she died from an asthma attack after rounds of sex, and that panic over what to do with her remains led him to mutilate her body.
