FG tenders bags of money, guns recovered from Justice Ademola‎’s home

The Federal Government on Wednesday tendered before a High Court of the Federal Capital Territory High Court, Maitama, Abuja, bags of cash in local and foreign currencies, guns, among other items allegedly recovered by operatives of the State Security Service from the house of a
judge of the Federal High Court, Justice Adeniyi Ademola, in October last year.


The items were tendered through the agency’s Exhibit Keeper, Mr. Umar Ahmed, who appeared in court as the 11th prosecution witness in the ongoing joint trial of Justice Ademola; his wife, Olabowale and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Joe Agi, on charges, including giving an receiving gratification to influence the course of justice.

Led in evidence by the lead prosecuting counsel, Mr. Segun Jegede, the witness took his time to identify the various items which were brought into the courtroom by the DSS operatives on Wednesday.

Umar totalled the various sums of money contained in three separate bags as N54m; $171,779; €4,400; £80 and R1,010 (Indian Rupee).

Other items tendered through the prosecution witness included, two Avar Magnum Pump Action gun, bearing the names of Justice Ademola and another judge of the Federal High Court in Abuja, Justice Ahmed Mohammed.

The guns were accompanied with original copies and photocopies of th licenses bearing Justices Ademola and Mohmammed’s name.

There were also two cartridges – a red head of 25 pieces and a white head of 10 pieces, among the items tendered.

Umar also identified two iPads and an 8GB flash drive as part of the items recovered from Justice Ademola’s house during October 7, 2016, raid on the judge’s house.

Umar said four mobile phones belonging to the judge were also recovered from the house.

He said the phones were however returned to the judge after taking them “to the lab for exploitation”.

“The iPads too were taken to the lab for the same purpose,” he said.

According to the witness, the phones were returned to Justice Ademola but the iPads were not.

Apart from the total sum of N39.5m contained in a ‘Ghana-Must-Go’ bag, the rest of the cash and other recovered items were contained in sealed transparent cellophane bags with different identification numbers.

While identifying the items, Umar said, “The white bag contains 12 bundles of N1,000 notes, making N500,000 per bundle. The total is N6m.

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