An Ikeja Special Offences Court on Wednesday sentenced a man, Emmanuel Iwuno, to death by hanging for robbing a motorist of Toyota Highlander.
Justice Olubunmi Abike-Fadipe convicted Iwuno for armed robbery and conspiracy to commit armed robbery.
Abike-Fadipe also sentenced Iwuno to 21 years in prison for conspiracy to commit robbery.
She held that prosecution sufficiently proved the two-count charge against Iwuno.
The judge noted that the victim of the robbery and a prosecution witness, Mr Obinna Mbah, testified that four men robbed him of the car on March 8, 2020, on Thomas Onyemachi Street, Afromedia, Okokomaiko, Lagos State.
According to the judge, the witness appeared truthful in both his written and oral evidence.
The judge said: “Mbah told the court that one of the men covered his face with a mask and forced him to lie down on the ground.
“He said the man threatened him with a gun, took his Infinix phone and money while another robber drove away in his car and the other two robbers sped away in a motorcycle shortly after.
“The witness said he entered a commercial motorcycle, and the motorcycle rider gave the robbers a hot chase.
“He said the defendant was apprehended after he rammed into a kiosk and crashed the car.”
Abike-Fadipe also said that the confessional statement of the convict corroborated the evidence of the witness.
“The defendant, in his confessional statement, said he was driving the stolen car and eventually crashed into a kiosk as he wanted to avoid killing a member of the public,” she said.
The judge said that although the defendant denied writing the statement and thumb printing on it, he failed to call to testify, the tea vendor in the place where he was arrested.
“The defendant is a liar as he failed to call the tea vendor as a witness,” she said.
The judge held that while the convict might not have pulled the gun on the witness, he was liable.
Lagos State counsel, Mrs Adebanke Ogunode, told the court that cartridges, including that of a locally-made cut-to-size single-barrel pistol, were found in the car when it crashed.
The offences contravene Sections 299 and 297(2) (a) of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.
