A Nigerian man, Sam Odeg, has recalled the gruesome m8rder of his neighbour’s seven-year-old daughter, Joy, by suspected ritualists five years ago.
Taking to Facebook on Saturday, November1, 2025, Odeg narrated how Joy was found d3ad with her private parts and eyes removed a few days after she went missing.
According to Odeg, the tragic incident began on October 31, 2025 when the minor suddenly disappeared while playing with her mates outside his shop.
The community launched a search party but all efforts to find her proved abortive.
One of the children claimed that a young man had approached them and asked Joy to come and take something.
Odeg said a suspect was later arrested in connection with the gruesome m8rder but nothing has been heard about the case since then, alleging a cover-up.
“It has been five years, yet no justice has been served. Kai! Joy girl! She was my neighbour. It was in the evening of October 31st, around 7:00pm. She was playing with her friends right in front of our shop,” he wrote.
Their voices echoed into the distance. I was sitting in my sister’s shop, gisting and laughing with everyone there. I saw her. We all did. She was laughing and running around with her mates.
Little did we know that would be the last time we would ever see her smile again.
It was already a few minutes past 9:00pm. Everyone was closing their shops, including my sister, when Joy’s mother walked in and asked if we had seen Joy. We responded in the negative. We had seen her just a few hours earlier playing with her friends, so where could she be?
Her mother ran out like a mad woman, tears in her eyes, screaming and shouting, “Joy! Joy! Joy! Where are you, Joy?”
That was when we knew something was wrong. Her sudden disappearance was unusual. Everybody started looking for Joy. We went to every possible place, but we couldn’t find her.
Then one of the children she had been playing with made a shocking confession. While they were playing, a young man had approached them. He signaled to Joy and asked her to come and take something. Joy ran to the man and that was all they knew.
Joy’s mother screamed. We all screamed. Our voices echoed all through that night. We called Joy, but our little girl didn’t respond. She was her mother’s first daughter, only 7 years old. All through that night, Joy didn’t return home. Whoever was holding her didn’t release her.
The next day, we set out to search again, but it didn’t yield any results. Silence… A few days later, Joy was found. But dead! Her private part had been cut off. Her tiny breasts cut off. Her eyes removed. She was found dumped on a track road among plantain trees.
The 7 year old Joy was gone. Our entire village went haywire. Everybody trooped out seeking justice. A young man was caught. All fingers pointed at him. His wife confessed that in the previous night, he made a call. He told whosoever he was talking with that he was going to deliver “the goat” to the buyer.
His wife claimed that she didn’t know who he was calling neither did she know anything about the goat he talked about. Everyone suspected that “the goat” must be Joy. It was just a code word.
It made headlines everywhere. Her mother wailed. Her siblings wept. We all couldn’t be consoled.
I carried the matter on my head. I wrote about it daily. I wanted justice to be served. I got threats but I didn’t back down.
Oh Joy! Joy girl! Who knows what you went through in the hands of your captors. Hei
Who knows how much you cried, screamed and groaned in endless pain as they kept cutting your skin with their sharp knives. Aaahhh
It happened on October 31st, 2020. It has been five years, yet no justice has been served. Nothing has been heard about the man again. No one knows anything about him anymore. No one knows where he is.
Was he guilty? No one knows. Was he innocent? No one knows. Was he imprisoned? No one can tell.
Facebook just exhumed it as a notification, and I got sad all over again. Facebook, you shouldn’t have reminded me about this again. Now, the memories look fresh like it happened just yesterday.
Joy girl, keep resting in peace. If you are still here, you would be 12 years old already, and might be in JSS 2.
May all whose hands are in your d3ath never go unpunished. Man may refuse to serve justice, but God doesn’t forget. He rewards every man accordingly, no matter how long it takes.
