An
Osun State High Court sitting in Iwo has sentenced five men who
kidnapped the wife of the Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Alhaja
Muibat Salaam, to 27 years in prison.
Justice Moshood Adeigbe while delivering
the judgment held that the prosecutors had been able to prove beyond
reasonable doubt that the kidnappers met and conspired before they
kidnapped their victim.
The five persons convicted by the court
are: Chukwudi Okereke (40); Ogbole Ochijile Elijah (25); Lucky Okonkwo
(33); Kaikine Mahah (35); and Philip Nwadinnor (30).
The judge ruled that each of the five
convicts would spend seven years in prison for the charge of
conspiracy; he sentenced them to 10 years imprisonment for the count of
kidnapping; and 10 years for the charge of unlawful possession of
firearms. He ruled that the jail terms would run concurrently since the
charges arose from the same crime.
The Speaker’s wife was kidnapped in
Ejigbo, Osun State on October 9, 2012 by men armed with guns while she
was returning home from work.
The judge said, “The confessional
statements were clear that the accused persons met at Royal Hotel in
Agbor, Delta State where they planned the kidnap, perfected it in Lagos
and carried it out in Ejigbo.
“The exhibits also showed that the five
accused persons kidnapped the PW2 (Mrs. Salaam), forced her into a
trailer and dragged her into the bush on their way to Lagos before men
of the Ogun State Police Command arrested them. I hold that the
prosecution have established their case and therefore found the five
accused persons guilty of conspiracy, kidnapping and unlawful
possession of firearms.”
The prosecution team led by the
Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Adewale Afolabi, told
the court that the convicts had confessed to the kidnapping in the
confessional statements each of them gave to the police during
investigation.
However, the defence counsel, Messrs.
Sam George and Fredrick Komolafe had urged the judge to temper justice
with mercy because the accused persons were married men with children.
But Justice Adeigbe ruled that the
kidnappers deserved the full punishment of the law because kidnapping
was a heartless and condemnable offence.
The defence counsel vowed to appeal the
judgment, saying the confessional statements were not tested. They said
that the best thing was to have ordered a trial within trial to be
able to authenticate the statements.
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