A Delta State High Court sitting in Kwale, has sentenced an ex-soldier and seven other suspected kidnappers to 104-year imprisonment for the abduction of the Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Mr. Monday Igbuya, in 2009.
A statement released by the Public Relations Officer, Mr. Ivovi Aruoriwo, Delta State Ministry of Justice on Tuesday, gave the names of the convicted to include Godspower Ikoro, Godspower omoniyi (an ex-soldier), Ernest Atteh, John Adapamu, Ife Freedom, Sunday Uba Tiemo, Kemi koinyang and Isaiah Mumbor.
Igbuya who was kidnapped on May 21, 2009 at Sapele, the administrative headquarters of Sapele Local Government Council was later released by his abductors six days later on May 27.
According to the statement, Justice O. Jaloggo-Williams found the eight accused persons guilty on two-count charge of kidnapping and demanding property with menace; and sentenced them to 10 years each with hard Labour for kidnapping; and three years each for demanding N100m with menaces.
The convicts were charged under the Criminal Code Law Section 364 (I.) and (in.) which prescribed 10-years jail term for offenders before the Delta House of Assembly enacted Anti-Kidnapping Law in 2016, which now prescribed life imprisonment for offenders.
The judge ruled that the accused were responsible for the kidnap of the Speaker, who was then a first timer at the Delta State House of Assembly and held that the sentences were to run concurrently.
The statement read, “The eight accused persons who were charged to court after their arrest by Security Agents on Charge No S/1c/2010 were later transferred from the Sapele High Court in 2011 to Kwale for trial on a six-count charge of conspiracy to commit a felony to wit, kidnapping, armed robbery and the substantive case of kidnap of Monday Igbuya and demanding with menace the sum of N100m as ransom.”
Justice Jaloggo-Williams however discharged the convicts on the count of armed robbery for lack of sufficient evidence by the prosecution.
