Bizarre!! "Bye, you won't see us again": Elderly couple's final words to daughter before train suicides

An elderly couple struggling to cope financially after their daughter moved back home with her boyfriend took their own lives by stepping in front of a train.

On the day they died, Peter Smith, 80, and his wife of more than 50 years, Betty, 78, waved goodbye to their daughter, Jane saying: “Goodbye, you won’t see us again.”

They then walked to an unmanned level crossing and stood holding hands in front of a freight train.

Shortly beforehand they had told a friend they were struggling because it was costing them £500 a week to support their daughter.

Jane, 50, didn’t attend the inquest but in a statement to the hearing at Lincoln Cathedral Centre she said her parents never mentioned any money problems.

She revealed she had argued with her mum on the morning she died.

She said: “I had asked if I could store some of my things in the spare room. She did not want me to as it would have made her house untidy.

“Later my father said he wanted to go into town. As they left, my father turned to me and said, ‘Goodbye, you won’t see us again’.”

 

Retired Post Office worker Peter and Betty met when they were both in their early teens before marrying.
The couple lived in Cherry Willingham, Lincs, while only child Jane lived in nearby Lincoln with her partner Tim Evans, 50.
The inquest heard Jane and Tim moved back into the family home in May last year after having sanitation problems in their own property.
Det Sgt Shanie Erwin of British Transport Police told the hearing she traced someone who spoke to Betty in the weeks leading up to her death.
She said: “During the conversation she [Betty Smith] was very upset. She described how she had thought about jumping off a railway bridge but persuaded her not to.
“She was complaining that it was costing in the order of £500 a week to feed and look after her daughter.”

Peter and Betty calmly walked to their deaths just two months after Jane returned home.
The inquest at Lincoln Cathedral Centre heard that the Smiths did not react when the driver of the 700-tonne train sounded his horn.
The couple died instantly as a result of massive injuries caused by the train, which was travelling at 45mph.
Central Lincolnshire coroner Stuart Fisher returned verdicts of suicide on both Peter and Betty Smith who died on 9 July last year.
The coroner said: “This is clearly an immensely tragic case.
“I have formed the view that looking at this case in the round that it is appropriate that I make a finding that Mr and Mrs Smith clearly did form an intention that they were going to take their own lives.”

N7,200 salary increment as reward for returning N12m

 

Josephine Ugwu, the airport cleaner who returned a passenger’s luggage containing local and foreign currencies to the tune of N12m has been rewarded with a N7,200 salary increment.

Ugwu, who works for Patovilki Cleaning Services, a concessionaire engaged by the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria to keep the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos clean, was on a monthly salary of N7,800 before the incident.

The National Diploma graduate of Our Saviour Institute of Science, Agriculture and Technology, Enugu, now enjoys a N7,200 salary increment, bringing her new salary to N15,000.

Meanwhile, Ugwu’s colleagues who expressed disappointment that such act of uncommon integrity was not noticed by the government.

They argued that a society that was quick to mete out punishment to offenders should also be quick to reward exemplary behaviour.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, one of Ugwu’s colleagues lamented that the government did not have a culture of rewarding and encouraging exemplary behaviour.

She said, “Some people have abused her and called her a fool for returning the bag. It now looks as if what she did was wrong. Most people will not be motivated to follow her lead when faced with similar situation. The government should have, at least, sent her a commendation letter for what she did.” Another colleague, identified simply as Faith, also expressed disappointment. She said Ugwu had returned passengers’ luggage with money in them for a record third time and all three had gone unnoticed.

She said, “Twice in December 2014, she returned passengers’ luggage with huge sums of money in them.

“One contained about N600,000 and the other had close to N2m. if it were to be a case of stealing and she was caught, I am sure the government would have been quick to send her to jail.”

Ugwu, however, said she had no regrets for what she did, but would not mind being compensated.

She said, “I believe that a good name is better than riches. This incident has taken my name far and wide and I am happy that it is for a good cause. God’s reward is the ultimate, but if the government will give me a proper job as promised, I will be happy.

“My company on its part has tried and I am grateful for the management’s action. My salary has been increased and I have also been promoted.”

Mrs. Eunice Anumudu, Ugwu’s supervisor at the airport, praised her integrity and uprightness, saying that Ugwu had become a role model, not only for her colleagues, but for all Nigerians.

“What she did is worthy of emulation. Many people in her shoes would have done otherwise. She is a role model to her colleagues and to all Nigerians. I will be happy if the government can do something to encourage her,” she said.

The Punch

N75.2bn Abacha’s loot to be returned back to Nigeria by Switzerland

Swiss officials have said the $380m siphoned off by the family of the late Head of State, Gen. Sani Abacha, and confiscated by the Geneva authorities, will be returned to Nigeria. The amount is about N75.2bn at N198/dollar interbank rate.

The file on the matter, opened since 1999, would be closed, the officials said in a statement on the website of the Geneva public prosecutor’s office.

According to the office, the move comes now that Nigeria and the Abacha family have struck a deal.

The Federal Government has long been chasing funds looted by the Abacha clan while the matriach was in power from 1994 to 1998.

The prosecutor’s office said overall, the Abacha clan was thought to have diverted about $5bn from the Nigerian treasury, adding that much of it ended up abroad.

“The $380m in question was seized in Luxembourg in 2006 on the orders of the Geneva justice authorities. The funds were under the control of various companies controlled by the Abacha family, which is considered a criminal organisation,” the prosecutor’s office said in the statement.