EMMANUEL UKUDOLO I Wednesday, July 04, 2018
IKEJA, Lagos, Nigeria – A Sexual Offences Court sitting in Ikeja, Lagos today ordered defence counsel in child defilement case involving a Supervisor at Chrisland School, Lekki, Mr. Adenekan Adegboyega to file written address with reply from the prosecutor to enable it rule on submission by counsel to the school, Mr. Olatunde Adejuyigbe(SAN) who had urged the court to reject the result of the polygraph test submitted for admission by Lagos State Prosecutor, Mr. Babajide Boye.
Justice Sybil Nwaka told the SAN to file his address with reply from prosecutor within 35 days on or before August 13, 2018 to enable her rule on the matter before adjourning the matter to 5/10/2018.
The judge gave the order after the polygraph expert, Mr. Falola Adebayo of Halogen Security, (a graduate of kwara State Polytechnic, University of Lagos, Diploma holder from American University of Polygraph Examination and a retired military intelligence operative of the Nigerian Airforce, (Intelligence squardron) led in evidence by the prosecutor had finished his testimony.
He had testified about how he arrived at the result of the test and the conclusion that the “defendant was not being truthfull when he denied allegation of sexual molestation” of the two years old girl(names withheld), having scored -9 in the Lie Detection Test. He also affirmed that he has conducted over 250 polygraph tests for financial institutions in Nigeria and that the polygraph test is 99.9 percent accurate and that he followed all ethical rules. He said Adenekan Adegboyega(defendant) voluntarily submitted himself for the test in the presence of two representatives of the school, with a letter of consent, and the mother of the victim and her uncle.
He told the court that he tried as much as possible to put the defendant at ease having verified whether he was diabetic, hypentensive and whether issues of hypertension and diabetes run in the family. He also said he would not have gone ahead with the test if his answers were in the affimative, adding that ethics forbids him from carrying out polygraph test on pregnant women, undergaged and overaged people.
He told the court that 10 questions were involved in the Polygraph Test, 3 relevant, 3 comparism and 4 symptomatic with the defendant required to answer just Yes or No. “So, he must understand the question. If you are diabetic or hypertensive, we will not do it”, he said and that three machines were used, Nymograph 1 &2, one to record breathing on the chest and the other on the abdomen, Cardiovascular and EVA and that he did not carry out medical test on the defendant since he is not a medical doctor. He said that the respondent is required to answer each question in 25 seconds.
Reacting to the testimony, Olatunde Adejuyigbe urged the court not to admit the Polygraph test result as evidence. According to him, the use of Polygraph test is foreign to Nigerian law and the law of evidence specifically and that to admit same amounts to ‘Quasi Adjudication’ since it is foreign to Nigerian law. He alluded to section 67, 68, 81 and 82 of the Evidence Act and posited that section 3 of the Act only makes provision for finger print impression and not lying and that the polygraph test was nothing but an opinion which is not allowed in law. He argued to allow an opinion will defeat the purpose of adjudication and give room for conjurers and crystalball gazers to take precedence.
“It is a foreign tradition and not part of our legal practice and it is a dangerous precedence for any court to admit same. So it is my submission that that the evidence be marked rejected because none of our law” permits it, he said.
In his reply on point of law, BT Boye alluded to section 4 of the Evidence Act and that the evidence is computer generated and relevant to the matter and as such the result is admissible since they were placed before the court to assist it in arriving at a reasonable decision. Following which Nwaka said “our laws must develop” and that the objection in the case should go as far as the Supreme court for the eminent jurists to decide on admissibility of Polygraph Test during trial.
