One of the suspects linked with the 2018 robbery attacks on some commercial banks in Offa, Kwara State, Ayoade Akinnibosun, has told an Ilorin High Court that the police asked him to implicate the Senate President, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, in the incident.
Akinnibosun and two other suspects, Ibikunle Ogunleye (2nd accused) and Adeola Abraham (3rd accused) narrated in court on Friday, how the police extracted statements from them by force during the investigation of the robbery incident.
The suspects also revealed that the principal suspect in the robbery incident, who was a dismissed police officer, Michael Adikwu, was shot dead by one Inspector Vincent attached to the police Intelligence Response Team (IRT).
Akinnibosun, Ogunleye and Abraham were examined and cross-examined by their counsel, Mathias Emeribe and prosecution counsel, Razaq Gold, in a trial-within-trial on how they were tortured and threatened by the police to make confessional statements.
The prosecution witness, Inspector Hitila Hassan, had told the court on
Thursday that the suspects voluntarily gave their statements under his
supervision. The lead prosecuting counsel, Prof. Wahab Egbewole, sought to
tender the statements as exhibit but the defence counsel, Emeribe objected.
Emeribe argued that the statements were not voluntarily taken, noting that they
fell short of the provisions of the Evidence Act particularly sections 28 and
29.
At the resumed hearing on Friday, Akinnibosun said that “Abba Kyari told me to
mention the name of Senate President Bukola Saraki that he gave me the guns for
the operations. But I declined to do so, because my life is at stake. “He (Abba
Kyari) promised that they would reward me handsomely and set me free if I can
indict Senator Saraki. When I disagreed, they called some policemen to take me
back to their cell. During this time my hands were tied to my legs in the
back,” he said.
The suspect added that he was the leader
of Kwara South Liberation Movement mobilising jobless graduates for the senator
representing Kwara South Senatorial District, Dr. Rafiu Ibrahim. The essence is
to secure government jobs for the boys, he said. The trio gave graphic details
of their horrifying experiences in police custody in Abuja. During one of their
encounters at the police IRT “theatre room”, they said in their presence
Inspector Vincent shot dead five Fulani men. “The theatre room,” according to
them, is the generator room of the IRT’s office and it also doubles as where
suspects are extra-judicially executed. They added that it was in the same
“theatre room” that Inspector Vincent otherwise known as “Mr. Torture” shot
dead Michael Adikwu for failing to indict them in the robbery incident.
According to Ogunleye, “they brought the late Adikwu to implicate us and he
said that he had not met any of us in his life, that’s why ‘Mr. Torture’ shot
him dead.” The trial judge, Justice Halimat Salman, adjourned the case to March
25, 2019 for continuation of trial-within-trial.