A Lagos High Court sitting in Ikeja on Friday discharged and acquitted three persons charged for conspiracy and the murder of Bayo Ohu, a political reporter and the Assistant News Editor of the Guardian Newspapers, murdered three years ago in Lagos.
The Lagos State government had accused the three men of conspiracy and the murder of Ohu.
The accused are Dada Yemi Adesanya, Ganiu Sulemon and Idris Balogun.
The Lagos State government which prosecuted the case had alleged that on the 20th of September 2009 at NO 9 Oyeniji Street, in Odukoya estate, Akowonjo Egbeda area in the Ikeja judicial division, the three men armed with offensive weapons robbed Ohu of one laptop computer and two mobile telephone sets.
The men were also alleged to have murdered Ohu in the process of robbing him of his belongings.
Ruling on a no case submission filed by the defence counsel, Yemi Omodele, the presiding judge, Justice Lateefa Okunnu held that the prosecution failed to prove its case against the men beyond reasonable doubt.
The court stated that no evidence whatsoever was placed before the court to show that the defendants were at the scene of the alleged crime.
Justice Okunu observed that none of the police officers listed before the court as witnesses came to testify saying “they abandoned the case and did not turn up”.
The court further held that there was no correlation in the evidence of the first prosecution witness, Kashi Taiwo and that of Bode Adetola, the 2nd prosecution witness, to show that the defendants were the persons that killed Ohu.
What the prosecution had against the accused person according to the court was at best ‘mere suspicion which goes to no issue’.
The court subsequently discharged the accused persons.
Ohu was shot and killed at his home in Lagos, on the morning of Sunday, September 20, 2009. Five assailants were believed to have attacked Ohu, stealing his laptop and cell phone.
Former Inspector General of Police Ogbonna Onovo had in January of 2010 announced the arrested of three men suspected to be involved in the murder of Ohu, including the suspect that pulled the trigger that killed the journalist.
The police authority who were pursuing a case of robbery as against the speculations of assassination had said that Ohu’s laptop and phones were recovered from the persons that bought them from the robbers adding that it was from them that the robbery suspects were traced and arrested.