News: Supreme Court Sentence Man To Death For Killing A Fulani Man

A farmer and father of five, James Afolabi, who was found guilty by the Kogi State High Court and the Court of Appeal for the murder of a Fulani man identified as Abubakar Mohammed has been sentence to death by the Supreme Court.


Supreme high court



The court which was presided by five-man panel, in a unanimous judgment delivered on Friday, held that there was no basis to disturb the concurrent finding of the trial and judgment of the lower courts in their previous judgments.


According to Dailypost, Kogi-born Afolabi was convicted and sentenced to death by the Kogi State High Court in Lokoja in 2012 relying on Afolabi’s confessional statement to the police, where he claimed to have shot Mohammed on the chest for straying into his (Afolabi’s) yam and cassava farm on February 27, 2009.


On March 22, 2012, the Court of Appeal in Abuja dismissed his appeal against the judgment and upheld the decision of the trial court, after which he took the matter to the Supreme Court.


Delivering the lead judgment in the appeal marked: SC/181/2012 on Friday, Justice John Inyang Okoro held that although the prosecution could not produce an eye witness at trial, it provided sufficient evidence, through its witnesses, “which gave vent to the confession of the appellant.


“And in any case, this court held in Mohammed v State (2007) 11 NWLR (pt 1045) 303 at 230 paragraph F that where an accused person confesses to a crime, in the absence of an eye witness of the killing, he can be convicted on his confession alone.


“For all I have said, I hold a strong view that the court below was on a strong wicket when it upheld the conviction and sentencing of the appellant upon reliance on his confessional statements,” he said.


WHAT DO YOU YOU HAVE TO SAY ABOUT THIS !! THOSE IT MEAN THAT THOSE WHO WAS KILLED BY FULANI MEN ARE NOT HUMANS??????


SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS HERE IN THE COMMENT BOX.