HOPE AFTER EIGHT YEARS

After eight good years of excessive and arbitrary detention without trial, hope appears to be on the horizon for one of the clients of ABSU Law Clinic who is set to be released on bail next week. We had earlier reported in previous blog posts about one Chinedu who has been in custody for eight years, after being arrested by the police, detained, arraigned before an Ideato South Magistrate Court on the charge of conspiracy to commit armed robbery and subsequently remanded in Okigwe Prisons since December, 2003.
Since then, Chinedu has been wallowing in detention, has not be formally charged before a High Court that has jurisdiction to try the charge and in the process, has apparently suffered loss of job and education opportunities, in addition to being exposed to disease, physical and psychological damage. To compound his woes, his family had no knowledge of his whereabouts since his arrest and he had lost all contacts with them.
Follow up visits to Ideato South carried by a team of clinicians comprising Chioma Nwigwe, Bethel Godfrey and Fred Ben revealed that his family indeed really had no knowledge of his whereabouts, his aged father, the breadwinner of the family, was no longer able to walk properly due to old age and was thus not able to earn an income any longer. He was however excited to hear about the whereabouts of his son whom he had presumed dead and assured the Clinic of his cooperation in every area he was needed.
The Clinic decided to take up the matter and secured a Lawyer to handle the matter on her behalf on pro bono basis. The first step in the process has already been taken to wit obtaining a certified true copy of the record of proceedings to facilitate his bail application which all things being equal will be filled at the High Court on Monday.
In a related development, the Clinic has continued in the slow but steady march towards securing the acquittal of one of her clients charged with armed robbery. We had also earlier reported about Chibu, as he will be simply referred to, who was charged with armed robbery, arrested at the age of seventeen as had been in detention for five years.
The Clinic has fully taken over the case after the amicable termination of the brief of the previous lawyer handling the matter, as the case file had been handed by the family to the clinic. The clinic has already contacted a lawyer who has applied for the case to be struck out at the Isuikwuato High Court.