The supreme court on Wednesday granted permission to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, to continue the trial of the former managing director of bank PHB, Francis Atuche, and wife,Elizabeth, who faced allegations of stealing N25.7bn from the bank.
The EFCC had arraigned Atuche and his wife, the then Financial Officer of the Moribund Bank PHB plc (now Keystone bank), Mr Ugo Anyanwu, before justice Lateefa Okunnu of the Lagos state High Court over alleged fraud.
The accused persons were later discharged after Justice Lateef-Lawal Akapo, held that the prosecution,the EFCC, failed to prove that capital market-based matters fall under the jurisdiction of the state high courts.
Mr Francis Atuche and his wife In a unanimous judgment, a five-man panel of justice of the apex court, led by Justice Dattijo Muhammad, voided a Court of Appeal order that directed the Chief Judge of Lagos State to re-assign the case to a new judge.
Justices of the apex court took turns to lambast the appellate court for making an order they described as “highly perverse.”
However, following an appeal the defendants filed in 2014 to challenge their trial, the Lagos Division of the Court of Appeal, in a judgment it delivered in September 2016, ordered Justice Okunnu to hands off the trial.
Though the appellate court declined to quash the charges, it, however, directed the Chief Judge of Lagos State to re-assign the case to another judge.
Meanwhile, when the case was called up for hearing, yesterday, counsel to the EFCC, Mr. Kemi Pinheiro, SAN, told the apex court that the appellate court had in a subsequent ruling on the case, curiously ordered that Atuche and his wife’s trial be handled by another new judge other than either Justice Okunnu or Lawal-Akapo.
Pinheiro decried that the decision of the appellate court greatly hampered the expeditious conclusion of the trial. After listening to the EFCC lawyer, the apex court panel unanimously agreed that the lower court’s decisions on the matter was “perverse” and, therefore, ought to be set-aside.
According to Justice Ejembi Eko who prepared and read the lead judgment of the apex court, the order which the Court of Appeal made on September 23, 2016, for the remittance of case to the Lagos State CJ for the purpose of re-assigning it to another judge, was not aimed to serve the interest of justice.
The apex court noted that the lower court did not adduce any reason why it disqualified the trial judge that took plea of the defendants in the first instance. Justice Eko stressed that such order, being “a contentious one”, required the lower court to give reasons why Justice Okunnu should not be allowed to continue with the trial.
The apex court panel equally noted that neither Justice Okunnu nor Justice Lawal-Akapo were accused of any wrongdoing by any of the parties to the case to warrant the transfer of the matter to a new judge. Consequently, it directed that the case should be returned to Justice Okunnu for continuation of trial of the defendants.
Aside the head of the panel, other Justices of the apex court that concured with the lead verdict were Justices Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, Paul Galinje and Iyang Okoro.