From Godwin Tsa, Abuja
The Abuja division of the Court of Appeal has been asked to set aside the judgment of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), which convicted an Abuja trader in Utako Market, Nelson Onwuemeodo, over the alleged offence of conspiracy and assault.
Nine Igbo traders who are executive members of Utako Market Shop Owners and Traders Association were rounded up and charged before the High Court of the FCT, Maitama, by the police, over alleged conspiracy and assault on Chief Denis Nweke and Nasiru Adamu, at the premises of a High Court.
Specifically, it is the case of the appellant that he was in court on the day of the alleged offence for a case involving Utako Market Association and the Minister of the FCT, from where he proceeded the National Assembly with other executive members of the association.
They were arrested and arraigned before the trial court on a fallacious three count charge of conspiracy to commit culpable homicide and assault.
At the end of the trial, six out of the nine traders, Nelson Onwuemeodo, Ezeliora Joseph, Emeka Okah, Zainab Nwaorgwu, Igwerna Ale and Ichia Michael Ndu were sentenced and convicted by Justice Peter Kekemeke in his judgment that was delivered on December 9, 2021.
In a 15- grounds of appeal, the appellant through his counsel, Chukwuma Ma-Chukwu (SAN), faulted the judgment of trial court was pervasive.
Ume formulated the following questions: “Whether the trial court was right in convicting and sentencing the appellant despite the fact that the totality of evidence of the prosecution witnesses graphically contracdicted each other and non was worthy of belief?
The prosecution having not fielded any of the right, proper and credible witnesses etc, whether the trial court was right to have still proceeded to convict and sentence the appellant.
The trial court having found as a fact that the police failed and refused to investigate the appellant’s defence of alibi, whether the conviction of the appellant was not wrong in law.
Whether the trial court’s finding: “…. in my humble view, the prosecution proved beyond reasonable doubt that 1st defendants conspired together ” and its holding: “conspiracy is a matter of inference from the acts of the parties” were founded as to vitiate the reasonable doubt required for the conviction of the appellant.
Ume submitted that unfortunately, the prosecution rather than proving its case beyond reasonable doubt, it ended up with testimonies full of contradictions and unreliable witnesses.
On this point, the appellant counsel referred the court to the testimonies of Prosecution Witness (PW1, PW2 and PW3), which he submitted were manifestly contradictory in nature.
He added that the statement the PW1 made to the police was substantially different from what he stated in court.
He further submitted that in the face of the material contradictions, there is nowhere the respondent offered explanations to reconcile the incongruities in the evidence of PW1, PW2 and PW3.
Ume submitted that the trial court was in grave error to have believed, acted and relied on the evidence of the prosecution witnesses, in convicting and sentencing the appellant for the offences despite the material contradictions that bedeviled same.
He insisted that the trial court was wrong to have convicted the appellant on the uncorroborated evidence of the victm of the offence.
Ume equally added that the trial court was in complete error to have convicted the defendants based on tainted witnesses as there has been a growing and standing animosity between PW1 and PW2 against the nine defendants.
That the defendants were convicted on the basis of alleged mere presence in the court, the alleged crime scene.
He submitted that having found as a fact that the plea of alibi raised by the appellant was not investigated the trial court was in grave error and occasioned a miscarriage of justice when it went ahead to convict and sentenced the appellant.
That the prosecution did not lead any evidence at all, whether direct or circumstancial, to show that the appellant conspired to commit the offence.
In the light of the whole circumstances of the appeal, the arguments advanced, Ume urged above, the appellant has prayed the appellate court to allow his appeal and set aside the judgment of Justice Kekemeke delivered on December 9, 2021, more particularly his conviction and sentence for being perverse and having occasioned a miscarriage of justice.