By ROMANUS OKOYE
Right now, a thick mixture of agony and anger pervades the atmosphere in Anam, a community in Anambra West Local Government Area of Anambra State.
Residents of the community are sad and angry, alleging that their promising son, Godswill Udechukwu, was unjustly persecuted and killed by the Irish authorities in an Irish jail.
And Godswill’s family insists that the Irish government must be forced to bring the killers of the young man to book. Godswill Udechukwu, a 32-year-old Nigerian, had left the shores of his fatherland and relocated to Europe in search of the proverbial greener pastures.
He settled in Dublin, Ireland. There he met, fell in love with and got married to Natasha Gray, a 25-year-old Jamaican. And their marriage was blessed with a male child. Although Natasha was said to have had a child for one Guy Mboze, that did not matter, as the new couple had an understanding about the older child.
But like a mountain of quicksand, the family’s peace and love crashed. Godswill was, at a point, given a suspended sentence for allegedly assaulting a Garda (Irish policeman). He later decided, along with his wife, to relocate from Dublin to London, to avoid more encounters with the law.
He went ahead to London, while the wife was to join him later. Then a mysterious incident happened. Natasha was on February 18, 2003 found dead in their apartment at Royal Canal View, Royal Canal Bank, Philsboro, Dublin, according a police report.
And Godswill was accused of being responsible. In August 2005, Godswill was extradited from London to face trial. He was accused of using a hammer to bludgeon his wife to death.
He was tried, convicted and given a life jail by Mr. Justice Kevin O’Higgins of the Central Criminal Court in Dublin. He has since died in prison. He told the court during his trial that he was not in Ireland as at the time of the incident.
“Check the border post and the surveillance cameras,” he had requested. But the prosecution went on. And as he was convicted, he told the court: “I did not kill my wife. You would have seen my wedding video. I am innocent. I am jailed tonight because I am an African and I am a black.” But all that did not change the verdict. Hon. Kennedy Mmoya, who spoke for the family, said from that moment, Godswill was tortured, harassed like an ordinary animal.
“In fact, he was treated like a convict as soon as he was in the custody of Ireland. His grandmother died of shock and his own mother lost her sight when they heard of his imprisonment.
Now he is dead too,” he lamented. Udechukwu’s family alleges that a lawyer, who was supposed to defend him, never discussed with Godswill, ignored phone calls and did not take time to study the book of evidence prepared against Godswill, even though he had been adequately advised to do so by the presiding judge. Both lawyer and client only met in court, according to the family. The family also said that Godswill was not allowed to contact the Nigerian embassy in Ireland.
Also, they faulted the composition of an all-white jury in a trial, involving a black man. They said none of the family members was allowed access to Godswill throughout that period, stating that one of them that landed in Ireland after a rigorous process of procuring travel documents was detained and sent back to Nigeria.
The family insists that Godswill was kept in a deplorable underground cell and denied access to recommended drugs and meal until his health failed and he was taken to one ‘hostile’ hospital. According to Godwill’s family, many members of the hospital staff were Natasha’s friends and that the hospital staff and management contributed towards Natasha’s funeral.
Many of the doctors and other staff of the hospital, they noted, were not happy with Godswill, believing that he murdered their friend. The family believes that all those involved with the couple in one way or another should have been investigated, even as they insist that the police should have investigated the incident more, including using CCTV footages, DNA and forensic examination of all the materials found at the couple’s apartment.
The family has also expressed shock at a section of the Irish press that did not care to report objective stories, saying the reports misled the public and might have influenced the jury’s final verdict. The family says even the prison officials also manipulated Godwill’s drugs and meals.
“Even when he took ill, they refused to take him to the hospital until the other inmates in the prison raised an overwhelming commotion. Sometimes, he was made to sign withdrawals from his prison account without justification. He was attacked and stabbed twice in prison, an act we suspect might have been engineered by those who killed his wife and also bent on getting him out of the way.” For these reasons, the family says the Irish authorities have a case to answer.
“They gave Godswill a very unfair trial and conviction, and they manhandled him,” they insist. The family’s demands include, among others, the re-composition of the jury, which must consist of blacks, and the re-trial of the murder case “even if on post-mortem with an attorney of our choice,” and an independent autopsy to find out the circumstances, surrounding his death.
They also insist that the CCTV footage of Udechukwu’s attack in prison must be produced by the prison officials to identify the attackers with a view to finding out their sponsors. The family wants a representative of Mr. Godswill Udechukwu’s family in Nigeria to be allowed to visit Mount Joy Prison and the hospital where he died.
They are also demanding that, while in Dublin, the family of Udechukwu must be given unrestricted access to his son, Jaydeen Godswill Junior.
And finally, the family are demanding that the Irish Government should pay the full cost of atonement as well as bear the expenses of conveying the remains of the deceased to Nigeria.
Source: The Sun
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