{"id":30856,"date":"2026-06-05T03:52:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T07:52:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=30856"},"modified":"2026-06-05T03:52:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T07:52:21","slug":"four-sentenced-to-death-for-killing-worshippers-at-catholic-church-in-nigeria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/06\/05\/four-sentenced-to-death-for-killing-worshippers-at-catholic-church-in-nigeria\/","title":{"rendered":"Four sentenced to death for killing worshippers at Catholic church in Nigeria"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><b class=\"ssrcss-1xjjfut-BoldText e5tfeyi3\">A court in Nigeria has sentenced four men to death for attacking a church in the south-western Ondo state in 2022 in a case which sent shockwaves across the nation.<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Forty-one worshippers were killed and more than 100 others injured when they\u00a0<a class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-africa-61697409\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">opened fire at the St Francis Catholic church in the town of Owo<\/a>\u00a0during a Pentecost service.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The court in the capital Abuja also sentenced the men &#8211; Idris Abdulmalik Omeiza, Al Qasim Idris, Jamiu Abdulmalik and Abdulhaleem Idris &#8211; to 20 years in prison for belonging to a terrorist group.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Presidential assent is required before any death sentence is carried out in Nigeria. There have not been any executions in the country for several years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Judge Emeka Nwite, who presided over the case, said the evidence presented against them was &#8220;neither shaken nor contradicted during cross examination&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He had ordered an accelerated hearing after the high-profile trial commenced in August 2025.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In his judgement, Justice Nwite said that the prosecution had proved their case beyond reasonable doubt as they had brought before the court witnesses who saw the attack, including one who testified to recognising two of the defendants as attackers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Hence this court finds the first to fourth defendants guilty of all nine counts,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"links\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1gccci3-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<ul class=\"ssrcss-94r6ik-Stack e1y4nx260\" role=\"list\">\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1gccci3-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-7zrqh4-LinkHeadline e3eyuya4\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-africa-61830085\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Who are the victims of Nigeria church massacre?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1gccci3-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-7zrqh4-LinkHeadline e3eyuya4\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-africa-61707872\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Blood on the altar after Nigeria church attack<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-vxwoax-ComponentWrapper e1aon0op1\" data-block=\"text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-126h8e-Spacer e1aon0op0\">\n<div data-testid=\"rich-text\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-nqezkk-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">One of the witnesses the court heard from was a woman who had her legs amputated from the knees, and had lost her left eye as a result of a dynamite explosion which the attackers had detonated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The nine counts included joining a terror group, and planning and carrying out killings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Prosecutor Ayodeji Adedipe said: &#8220;Justice has been served, justice has been done to the deceased who were murdered in cold blood.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The men&#8217;s defence lawyer said they would appeal against the sentence.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">During the trial, the defendants said they had been tortured, including being hung from the ceiling, beaten countless times, and using electric shocks on their genitals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A fifth defendant, Momoh Otuho Abubakar, was discharged and acquitted by the court due to insufficient evidence against him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He was accused of having financed the attack, by allegedly receiving 800,000 naira (\u00a3440; $590) twice from another suspect &#8211; who is still at large &#8211; and then disbursing the funds to the attackers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">During cross examination, however, Abubakar said the money in his account was the proceeds of his farming business, as well as activities from his cooperative society. He denied that the four other defendants were beneficiaries of the money.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Since the Owo attack, Nigeria has witnessed many more attacks on churches across the country as it continues to grapple with rising insecurity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><a class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cly3vl3yp2do\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">US President Donald Trump has accused Nigeria of failing to protect its Christian population<\/a>\u00a0from jihadist attacks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">On Christmas Day, the US hit two camps run by a jihadist group in north-western Nigeria, and threatened more if attacks continued.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Claims of a genocide against Nigeria&#8217;s Christians have been circulating for some time in right-wing US circles, but organisations monitoring political violence in Nigeria say most victims of the jihadist groups are Muslims.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Nigerian government also denies that Christians are being persecuted in the country.<\/p>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cj0p57q1m36o\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">bbc.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\">A court in Nigeria has sentenced four men to death for attacking a church in the south-western Ondo state in 2022 in a case which sent shockwaves across the nation. Forty-one worshippers were killed and <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/06\/05\/four-sentenced-to-death-for-killing-worshippers-at-catholic-church-in-nigeria\/\" title=\"Four sentenced to death for killing worshippers at Catholic church in Nigeria\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30857,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[109,2,6],"tags":[7385,2045,3281,12580,3539,445,12473,2349,12578,12579,8993,169],"class_list":["post-30856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news","category-world","tag-abuja","tag-church-shooting","tag-death-sentence","tag-dynamite","tag-explosion","tag-genocide","tag-jihadist-group","tag-nigeria","tag-ondo-state","tag-owo","tag-terrorist-group","tag-torture","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30856"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30858,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30856\/revisions\/30858"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}