The trial of kidnap
kingpin, Chukwudumeme Onwuamadike, alias Evans, will resume on September 13,
2018, before Justice Adedayo Akintoye of the Lagos State High Court in
Igbosere.
The trial, which last held
on June 26, 2018, had been put on hold as a result of the annual vacation of
judges.
Evans is facing two separate
charges bordering on conspiracy to kidnap, kidnapping and attempted murder.
On June 26 when the case
was last heard, the court dismissed applications by the defendants, seeking to
quash the charges on the contention that the two charges before Justice
Akintoye were duplications of earlier charges filed against Evans and others
before Justices Hakeem Oshodi and Oluwatoyin Taiwo of the Lagos State High
Court.
In the applications filed
in May, Evans’ original lawyer, Mr Olukoya Ogungbeje, who later withdrew his
services, had contended that the two charges before Justice Akintoye were
“grossly defective, repetitive and amounted to an abuse of court processes”
because Evans had earlier been charged before Justices Oshodi and Taiwo.
But the Lagos State Director
of Public Prosecutions, Ms Titilayo Shitta-Bey, maintained that the charges
were not an abuse of court processes because the different charges contained
different victims allegedly kidnapped or murdered by the defendants.
Ms Titilayo Shitta-Bey said
the state decided to file different charges to make the cases tidy, adding that
different defendants were charged alongside Evans in the different charges.
Ruling on June 26, Justice
Akintoye upheld the Director of Public Prosecutions, arguments and dismissed
Evans’ applications.
Justice Akintoye then
adjourned till September 13, after court’s vacation, for continuation of trial.
Evans and his co-defendants
have pleaded not guilty to all the charges and have been in custody since
August 30, 2017, when they were first arraigned.
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