Ask Google’ is a common refrain when people need answers to issues they cannot solve ordinarily. But a 19-year-old undergraduate, Ade (surname withheld), recently made wrong use of the application when he used it to search on what he could to do to a girlfriend who refused to abort a two-month-old pregnancy she had for him.
At the end of his search, he got a knife, went to his girlfriend’s house and stabbed her twice on the stomach and also slashed her throat.
The suspect is currently in police net at the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Oyo State Police Command, over an alleged murder attempt.
Crime Reports learnt that Ade, a 100 level student in one of the universities in the South Western part of Nigeria, allegedly committed the act on Thursday, August 11, at the residence of his girlfriend’s parents at Sango-Alaro area of Ibadan at about 2:30p.m.
But for the presence of a policeman, Sergeant Ayeni Oluwafemi, who was the girl’s neighbour and who heard her cry, Crime Reports learnt that the 19-year-old victim would have died in a pool of her blood while his assailant would have escaped. But on rushing to the room where the cry came from, the policeman reportedly met the suspect, holding a knife and about to walk out. He promptly pushed him back, handcuffed his hands and called for assistance to save the girl.
Ade, who spoke with Crime Reports, confessed that he acted the way he did because “my girlfriend got pregnant for me.”
The teenage also told Crime Reports during an interview that he got the clue on how to resolve the issue of his unwanted pregnancy through the help of Google.
According to the young man, “I met my girlfriend about two months ago on Facebook. We had a mutual friend and I added her. She accepted my request and we got to know each other. I proposed a relationship to her and she accepted. We had sex only once on July 4. I did not protect myself.
“On August 10, she told me that she was pregnant. The next morning, on Thursday August 11, she called me that her parents wanted to see me. I went to her parents at Alaro area of Ibadan and they wanted to know what my intention was on the pregnancy. I suggested that she had an abortion but they said they could not abort for their daughter because it was against their belief. I told them that I would get back to them on Monday, August 15.
“I left for home confused, but on the way home, different thoughts went through my mind because I didn’t want my parents to know. I didn’t want to disappoint them. I was with my phone at home and I picked it and typed “What to do if my girlfriend does not want to have an abortion on Google”. It brought out different options that I can deny, which I didn’t deny.
“Another option was to convince her to have an abortion, which did not work. There were also other options but the last one was that I could kill her. I chose that option because she was the only one who knew my house and I believed that if I killed her, no one would be able to trace my house and I would get away with my action.
“To kill, Google gave me an option to use poison, which I knew no pharmacy would sell to me. Other options were to use a gun or a knife. Knife was easy to get, so I went to the market same day to buy a knife and returned to her house. I did not meet her at home so I called her and waited for her. When she came in, I attacked her with the knife but she was resisting. I stabbed her on the right and left sides of her stomach and slashed her throat.
“Unfortunately for me, her screams got to a neighbour and he came in. Coincidentally, he is a policeman so he handcuffed me and I was arrested. It was the fear of disappointing my parents that made me take the action.”
Crime Reports learnt that though the lady survived the attack, she was still in the Intensive Care Unit of a hospital in the South West part of Nigeria where doctors had been battling to keep her alive.
Confirming the incident, the police image-maker in Oyo State, Adekunle Ajisebutu, a Superintendent of Police, said that the suspect would be arraigned in court after the conclusion of investigations.
