Adamawa-North lawmaker, Senator Elisha Abbo, has won the case of assault instituted against him before a Magistrate Court in Zuba, Abuja by the Nigeria Police Force.
This is despite a viral video showing Abbo assaulting a woman, Osimibibra Warmate; and a televised press conference in which the lawmaker apologised to the victim.
Punch Newspaper reports that, the Magistrate, Abdullahi Ilelah, who upheld a no-case submission filed by Abbo, said the police failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the lawmaker assaulted Warmate on May 11, 2019.
The case with suit number CR/010/2019 spanned from July 8, 2019, till June 18, 2020.
The two witnesses that testified against Abbo were Warmate – who was the nominal complainant – and a police officer, ASP Mary Daniel, who investigated the matter.
In her testimony, Warmate said she had gone to visit a friend, Kemi, at Pleasure Chest Sex Toy Shop, Banex Plaza, Wuse 2, Abuja on May 11, 2019 when the lawmaker walked in with three women.
She said suddenly, one of the women that accompanied Abbo started vomiting and later fainted.
Warmate said when she left the shop, she received a frantic call from Kemi asking her to come to her aid as the lawmaker had accused her of putting something in the shop’s air conditioner system that caused one of his female companions to vomit and was threatening to get her arrested.
The victim said when she returned to the shop and was cleaning up the vomit, two men, one of whom was a policeman in uniform, barged into the shop.
She said Abbo told them to arrest Kemi for insulting him but Kemi began pleading and then picked up her phone to tell her father that she was being arrested.
Warmate added, “As one of the men moved to take the phone, I begged him and said it was her father that she was talking to. Then the defendant (Abbo) pounced on me, punched me on my face and in the eye. He slapped me several times and asked me why I interfered.
“He said he would make me a scapegoat for interfering and asked the two men to arrest me. The defendant (Abbo) pulled me by the hair and pushed me downstairs and to a car. I called my mother and I was being arrested.
“While in the car, the people on the premises told the defendant (Abbo) that he needed to report to the police on the premises before he could leave but the defendant (Abbo) refused and the security guards in the plaza had to lock the gate.”
Warmate said her mother was able to intervene and after much pleading, she was let go by Abbo.
The victim said she began to feel severe pains in her body due to the beating and she went to a private hospital, Mega Eyesight, and also reported the matter to the police.
Under cross-examination, Warmate admitted that she was not a nursing mother at the time of the incident as widely reported.
She also stated that she was not the one who recorded the video of the incident but obtained it from the owner of the shop where the incident occurred.
