Some officials of the Nigeria Correctional Service (NCoS) have said that there is no truth in reports that convicted socialite, Idris Okuneye aka Bobrisky has been moved from the Ikoyi Correctional Centre to the Kirikiri Correctional Centre.
Recall that media reports earlier indicated that Bobrisky, who was sentenced to six months in prison for naira abuse on Friday, April 12, was discreetly moved over the same weekend from the Ikoyi to the Kirikiri facility.
However, an NCoS official who pleaded anonymity as he was not permitted to speak on the matter, said the convict did not commit a capital offence to warrant his transfer to a maximum prison where inmates serving life and death sentences were mostly kept.
“Bobrisky has not been moved, he is still here in Ikoyi. He was not sentenced to death and didn’t get a life sentence either.
“Those people sentenced to death and given life sentences are mostly kept in the maximum prison. That is mostly based on capital punishment.
“As for Bobrisky, he didn’t commit a capital offence, so why would they take him to Kirikiri,” The Punch quoted the NCoS official as stating.
Another NCoS official indicated that plans were underway to shuffle inmates between custodial centres in the state but such plans have not been executed.
“Sometimes, when we discover that the population of inmates is much in a facility, we decide to move them just to decongest.
“We are only considering that at the moment and not that anyone has been moved. If the prison authorities want to move, they have the right.
“We also do so if the person has a communicable disease or because the inmate requested it for proximity to the family or an appeal on humanitarian grounds.
“The leadership might also say, ‘Let’s spread those who have less than one year sentence’, which may apply to Bobrisky, just to create space for those awaiting trial. But such people rarely go to the maximum prison,” the official said.
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