A 16-year-old girl, Joy Afekafe, has been sentenced to life imprisonment for the brutal killing of Dr. (Mrs.) Funmilayo Sherifat Adefolalu, a lecturer at the Federal University of Technology (FUT), Minna.
Justice Mohammed Adishetu Mohammed of the Minna High Court 4 delivered the judgment on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, after finding the teenager guilty of armed robbery and culpable homicide.
Afekafe committed the crime when she was just 14 years old. She had resumed work as a housemaid at the late lecturer’s home in Gbaiko, Minna, on October 2, 2023, but was fired shortly after for stealing property and foreign currency.
PM NEWS gathered that she was introduced to the Adefolalu household by one Pastor Ojo Peters of the Voice of Mercy Church, which both the victim and Afekafe’s mother attended.
In what prosecutors described as a premeditated attack, the teenage maid recruited two friends known as DJ Wallex and DJ Smart to retaliate against the woman who sacked her.
According to her confession to the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), the trio stormed Dr. Adefolalu’s residence on October 28, 2023. She was stabbed multiple times and eventually bludgeoned with a wooden stool while trying to defend herself.
The attackers fled with her phones, laptop, and more foreign currency.
Delivering judgment after over two hours of proceedings, Justice Mohammed said the prosecution proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.
“That the death of Dr. Mrs. Funmilayo Sherifat Adefolalu was caused by the convict with her friends, now at large, when they used knives to stab her severally and eventually hit her with a wooden stool with the intention to kill her,” he ruled.
The court noted that while Section 221 of the Penal Code prescribes a death sentence for culpable homicide, Afekafe was a minor — just 14 — at the time of the offence.
By law, death sentences cannot be passed on offenders under 18 years old.
Justice Mohammed therefore sentenced her to life imprisonment for culpable homicide and 10 years imprisonment for armed robbery, both to run concurrently in a custodial facility.
The two accomplices remain at large at the time of filing this report.
