Emmanuel Ukudolo
December 14, 2015 – A Lagos High Court sitting in Igbosere today sentenced the dismissed Divisional Police Officer (DPO), Segun Fabunmi to 10 years jail after finding him guilty of manslaughter and causing grievous bodily harm.
Fabunmi, the former DPO of Pen Cinema Police Station, Agege, a suburb of Lagos, had served in the Nigerian Police Force for about 28 years and will now serve the next 10 years in prison.
Justice Olabisi Akinlade sentenced Fabunmi to 10 years jail for manslaughter following the shooting to death of one Ademola Daramola) during the 2012 fuel subsidy protest in Lagos.
Justice Akinlade also found Fabunmi, a dismissed Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP), guilty of shooting three other persons, Alimi Abubakar, Egbujor Samuel and Chizorba Odoh, during the protest, thereby causing them grievous bodily harm. She sentenced him to five years on this count.
In her judgment she found the accused guilty of manslaughter and causing grievous bodily harm and sentenced him to 15 years imprisonment for both offences. Both sentences are to run concurrently. The court evaluated the evidences tendered before it by the prosecutor on the 7 count charges against the accused, as well as the plea of the accused.
Fabunmi was alleged to have committed the offence during the January 2012 fuel subsidy protests in Lagos. He was accused of killing one Mr Ademola Daramola on January 9, 2012, during the fuel subsidy protests.
His murder charge was reduced to manslaughter. Fabunmi had claimed, in his testimony before the court, that he along with five junior officers had responded to a distress call at the Yahaya Abatan Junction, Ogba, Lagos State on the said date.
He said that on getting to the scene of the incident on the said date, some hoodlums tried to dispossess him of his weapon leading to an unexpected discharge of ammunition which inadvertently killed Daramola.
The Prosecution led by the Lagos State Director of Public Prosecution Mrs. Idowu Alakija during the trial called ten prosecution witnesses who testified that Fabunmi chased Daramola and shot at him.
The judge held that the prosecutor satisfactorily proved the offence of murder but that the evidence provided by the defence team led by Mr. George Oguntade SAN, availed the defendant of the defence of provocation, resulting in the lesser charge of manslaughter.
Ade, a fashion designer, was shot around 9am on January 9, 2012 when the defendant led a patrol team, comprising five junior officers to Yaya-Abatan and Abeokuta Streets around Ogba area of Lagos.
