The Rivers State High Court has convicted and jailed fraudsters, Aso Morrison and Frank Biobarakuma, seven years over their involvement in crude oil racketeering to the tune of $662,300.
The ICPC spokesperson, Azuka Ogugwa, in a statement signed on Thursday, said the duo were arraigned before Justice B. A. Georgewill on a 17-count charge bordering on conspiracy, forgery and obtaining by false pretence.
The statement did not however reveal the date the convicts were jailed. Efforts to contact the ICPC media team for details of the date were unsuccessful. They did not respond to the Gazette’s request as of the time of filling this report.
However, the statement said the convicts committed the crime between March 2012 and February 2013 in Port Harcourt, the Rivers state capital.
The anti-graft commission further stated that the investigation had revealed how the convicts and others at large fraudulently obtained the sum of $260,000 and $402,300 from a South Korean national, Jung Yongmin, under the pretext of selling Nigerian crude oil to him.
The ICPC said their actions were contrary to Sections 1 and 8 of the Advanced Fee Fraud and Other Related Offences Act, 2004 and Section 467 of the Criminal Code Act, 2004.
The commission said the convicts who were first arraigned sometime in March 2013 before Justice B. A. Georgewill of Rivers State High Court had earlier entered a “not guilty” plea when the charges were brought before them and that set the tune for a long legal battle.
But the trial judge, S. C. Amadi, Chief Judge of Rivers State who inherited the case after the elevation of Justice Georgewill to the Court of Appeal found the convicts guilty on all 17 counts.
In their allocutus to the court, defence counsel pleaded that the convicts were first-time offenders who have children to cater for and that the court should consider non-custodial sentencing which was not granted.
Handing down judgment, Justice Amadi sentenced the duo to 3 years in prison for counts 1-4, 7 years in prison for counts 5 and 6, and 3 years in prison for counts 7-17 without any option of fine.
The sentences are to run concurrently.
The court further advised that the South Korean Embassy (the petitioners) be informed of the judgment which is a consequence of their petition to ICPC.
