Ghanaian couple jailed 25 years for beating 5-year-old boy to death in New York

A Ghanaian couple received a 25-year jail sentence for fatally beating a 5-year-old boy in New York. The court found the boy’s mother, Valerie Owusu, 28, and her boyfriend, Emmanuel Addae, also 28, guilty of beating King Owusu with at least four different instruments at their residence near the Lefrak City apartment during the emotionally charged court proceedings. The sad incident happened in March 2021.

The jury, while pronouncing judgement, convicted the two of second-degree murder on March 22. On Wednesday, they received the final verdict from the court. In the ruling, no one was “more deserving of a maximum sentence” than the defendants in this case.

Suffolk County District Attorney Raymond A. Tierney agreed but saw no cause for celebration.

“The jury has spoken, but unfortunately, that will not bring back this young boy,” Tierney said.

The court provided the case’s facts. The prosecutor disclosed that after the two had beaten the hell out of the young boy, they looked on unconcerned as the child’s condition worsened over a period of three days.

To make matters worse, they did not seek medical attention for King Owusu, the child victim. Instead, they took him to the home of Addae’s parents in Long Island after the boy had lost consciousness.

After they dropped the boy off with Addie’s parents, the authorities rushed him to the local hospital after receiving a distress notice.

Sadly, little King Owusu died.

“These defendants, one of whom was his own mother, beaten and suffered this little boy for days until he, unfortunately, succumbed to his severe and extensive injuries,” Tierney stated after the couple’s conviction.

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The use of abusive means of correcting children is a common practice in Ghana, where the laws seem overly relaxed and hardly bite victims; however, in countries such as the UK, where the two Ghanaians lived, the law is always sharper and more proactive in dealing with such lawless behaviours.