After failing to kill mother,man commits suicide by setting family house ablaze(Photo)

A 25-year-old school drop-out and drug addict, Tobechuk­wu Ogbonna, has committed suicide in the family house after setting it on fire.

Ogbonna is believed to have done so in frustration because he failed to kill his mother and elder brother. He also chopped off the head of the family pet dog which was barking at him while the fracas between him, his mother and broth­er lasted.

Prior to razing the house, Og­bonna was said to have attacked his mother with a machete after having an altercation with her. He dealt machete cuts on her head and other parts of the body. But her loud scream for help drew the at­tention of neighbours, who broke the passage door and rushed in to rescue her from the deadly grip of the evil son.

While she was being taken to the Federal Medical Cen­tre for treatment, Ogbonna attacked his elder brother too with the same machete fully intent on killing him. Fortunately, the brother was able to escape by scaling over the fence.

Feeling disappointed that he failed to take the lives of the two people that made him angry, he rushed back to where the family dog was chained somewhere in the compound and barking, clearlyagi­tated by the fracas going on around it. In one swoop, he chopped off the head of the dog for daring to bark at him while he was on his deadly mission.

For long, Ogbonna, who was known in the neighbourhood by the sobriquet mbe (an Igbo name for tortoise) had been a thorn in the flesh of residents. Ogbonna dropped out of Williams Second­ary School, Afugiri, Umuahia, when his stubbornness could no longer be tolerated by the school.

Sunday Sun gathered that his late mother was always going to the school to plead on his behalf each time the principal, Mr Isiguzo sent him away for bad behavior.

Angered that he had failed in his mission of wiping out the family, he locked the passage door. , While the people that re­ported the matter to the police station and the policemen that came with them waited outside for him to come out and be arrest­ed, they soon noticed thick smoke rise up from the building.

Within minutes, fire had taken over the entire building. Promptly a distress call was made by a neigh­bour to the men of fire service who came quickly to control the fire and prevent it from spreading to adjoin­ing buildings.

A tenant in the compound, Jo­seph Mark, who witnessed the in­cident told Sunday Sun that it oc­curred around eleven in the night.

“It was during the argument he had with his mother that the young man dealt several machete blows on her. As if that was not enough, Mbe, ran back into the building and at­tempted to attack his elder brother who quickly escaped by scaling the fence of the building,” Mark said.

“It was at that point that he locked himself inside the building and within seconds, thick smoke started coming out and before we knew what happened, fire had cov­ered the roof and other parts of the building.”

Another eyewitness, Mr Abdul­fatai Oyadele said that the victim was a suspected drug addict, who had been terrorizing the family and people in the area.

“Yes, he has been a terror to the people of this street and beyond”, Oyadele said