Widow Drags Ondo Govt To Court Over Son’s Disappearance

• The claimant, who lost her husband, some months ago, said that her son was admitted into the juvenile home in 2017 when he was three months old.

One Mrs. Opeyemi Adegboyega has sued Ondo State government over an alleged disappearance of her child, Oluwaseun Omoniyi.

Her child allegedly disappeared from the custody of the state Juvenile Home, Akure.

Also joined in the suit filed before the state High Court are the state commissioner for women’s affairs and the state Attorney General of the state.

The claimant, who lost her husband, some months ago, said that her son was admitted into the juvenile home in 2017 when he was three months old.

She disclosed that she was in the hospital receiving treatment when the three-month-old boy was admitted into the state Juvenile Home, Akure.

According to Adegboyega, she was sick and the juvenile home offered to take care and also take custody of her three children to enable her to follow up on her treatment, but she and her mother agreed to leave just the three months old and the youngest at that time.

She said upon her full recovery a month after, she went back to the juvenile home with her mother to demand for her baby boy but she was told that her child had died.

She said the officials of the Juvenile home also informed her that his corpse had been deposited at the mortuary of the Ondo State Specialist Hospital.

On getting to the state hospital, the widow said she was told that the hospital did not receive any corpse of a child from the Ondo State Juvenile Home at that period.

According to her, all petitions on the matter to the state Governor, Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, the Ministry of Women Affairs, and the Department of State Services (DSS)had yielded no result.

Filling the suit through her lawyer, Barrister Oju Kekemeke, Adegboyega sought an order of the court directing the defendants to account for the whereabouts of Omoniyi Oluwaseun whose disappearance occurred while in the custody of the Ondo State Juvenile Home under the supervision of the Ondo State Ministry of Women Affairs.

She also sought an order from the court to direct the defendants to pay her a sum of N50 million as “exemplary and aggravated damages” and a N40million as general damages for the excruciating pain, anguish, personal loss and psychological trauma caused by the negligent act of the defendants, as well as N5million damages as “cost of this action.”