An Owerri Chief Magistrate Court in Imo State has remanded a 38-year-old woman, Juliet Igwe, at the Owerri Correctional Centre over allegations of brutal abuse and attempted murder of her five-year-old domestic maid.
Prosecutors told the court that the child, identified as Onyinyechi, was subjected to extreme cruelty, including burns inflicted with candlelight on her private parts, scalding with boiling water on her hands, and multiple other injuries that left her in critical condition.
Igwe was arraigned before Chief Magistrate B. U. Adikibe on a one-count charge of attempted murder, filed by the Imo State Police Command on the authority of the Commissioner of Police. The alleged offence was said to have occurred on November 25.
Police prosecutors informed the court that the charge carries a possible sentence of life imprisonment, prompting the magistrate to rule that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the matter.
Chief Magistrate Adikibe consequently ordered that Igwe be remanded in custody and directed that the case file be transferred to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for legal advice and further action.
Court documents revealed that the injured child was allegedly kept in a critical state for several days without medical care before she was eventually rescued.
The case drew widespread public outrage after Stand For Humanity Foundation, a human rights organisation, discovered the child, facilitated her rescue, and assisted law enforcement in arresting the suspect on December 4, as disturbing videos linked to the incident circulated online.
