14-Year-Old Bride Kills Her 35-Year-Old Groom Along With His Three Friends
A child bride forced into marriage in Nigeria killed her husband and three of his friends by lacing a meal with rat poison.
By Sadho Ram — 11 Apr 2014, 12:23 PM — Updated over 10 years ago
A child bride forced into marriage in Nigeria killed a groom and three of his friends with a poisoned meal
Fourteen-year-old Wasila Umaru was married last week to 35-year-old Umaru Sani, according to assistant superintendent Musa Magaji Majia.
go.com
Over the weekend, the groom invited a dozen friends to celebrate at his Ungwar Yansoro village
When Umaru invited a dozen friends to celebrate in northern Ungwar Yansoro village, near the city of Kano, the teenager slipped the deadly chemical into a rice dish. Umaru died the same day along with friends Nasiru Mohammed and Alhassan Alhassan, while another female victim, Indo Ibrahim, died in hospital hospital while receiving treatment.
The 14-year-old confessed saying that she poisoned him because she was forced into a marriage with a man that she did not love
A spokesman for the Kano State Police Command, Musa Magaji Majiya, told the website CKNnigeria that Wasila bought the rodent pesticide known as Shinkafa Bera at a village market for less than a US penny.
nypost.com
“The suspect confessed to the act and claimed that because she does not love her husband, she resorted to taking this option. Corpses were taken to hospital for examination. Investigation is on top gear,” the police spokesman said.
inquisitr.com
She is cooperating with police and likely will be charged with culpable homicide
Majia said Thursday that the teenage suspect is cooperating with police and probably will be charged with culpable homicide.
dailymail.co.ukChild marriage is common in Nigeria and especially in the mainly Muslim and impoverished north, where the numbers increase in times of drought because a bride price is paid and it means one less mouth to feed
In this photo taken on Saturday, July 20, 2013, a woman protests against underage marriages in Lagos, Nigeria.
Image via go.comFifty percent of Nigerian girls living in rural areas are married before they turn 18, according to the U.N. children's agency. That's a lot of child brides in a country of some 170 million people of whom half are under 18.
go.comChild brides often suffer difficult pregnancies — the leading cause of death worldwide for girls aged 15 to 19 — and are much more likely to contract AIDS and be subjected to domestic violence, according to the International Center for Research on Women.
nydailynews.comEarly and forced marriage is classified as modern-day slavery by the U.N. labor organization, and Nigeria's Child Rights Act prohibits marriage before 18. But that federal law competes with Islamic Shariah law that holds in most northern states.
nypost.com
No one in Nigeria has been prosecuted for marrying a child, including Sen. Sani Ahmed Yerima, infamous for divorcing a 17-year-old that he married when she was 15 so he could marry a 14-year-old Egyptian girl in 2010, when he was 49. He had to divorce one of his child brides because Islamic law allows a maximum of four wives at a time. Many child brides are divorced, for that reason and because of incontinence and other medical problems caused by difficult pregnancies, according to local child rights advocates who say such girls are put out on the street.