A farmer, Gbenga Akintola, has been handed a 21-year jail term by an Ondo High Court, sitting in Akure, the Ondo state capital, for robbery.
Akintola had pleaded not guilty to the five-count charge brought against him by the state security outfit codenamed Amotekun.
He was arraigned for conspiracy to commit felony with armed robbery.
Amotekun had filed a charge against him on September 20, 2022, alleging that Akintola and another person still at large, sometime in August and October 2021, around Oke-Olifi via Itanla Junction, Ondo town, allegedly robbed Onuh Chidinma of her valuables.
The valuables include itel phone valued at N20,000 and the sum of N150 in her bag; Rufus Rhoda of her small techno phone valued at N6,500, techno K-7 phone valued at N35,000 and the sum of N4,500.
He was alleged to have robbed one Ayodeji Oluwayemisi of her bag, an itel phone valued at N4,500 and the sum of N2,800, while armed with a cutlass and other offensive weapons.
According to the Police prosecutor, Alako Abdulahi, while testifying, said that men of Amotekun Corps brought the defendant to the police station on October 19, 2021, with four mobile phones, a motorcycle, a bag and a small purse recovered from him.
Abdulahi said that the defendant admitted those items were found on him but that a man called Sunday Igbo handed them over to him.
Also, while testifying, one of the victims, Rufus Rhoda she and Chidinma were going to Mount Olive prayer centre when the defendant came out of the bush, masked with a cap and armed with a cutlass.
Rhoda said that the defendant asked them to drop their bags and all the contents, after which the defendant carried the bags and ran into the bush. She said that her bag contained techno 7, another small techno and the sum of N4,500.00
But the defendant, said that the stolen items were recovered from the house of Sunday who was at large.
Akintola added that the police had threatened to charge him to court for robbery if he did not pay N200,000 to bail himself.
However, in his judgement, Justice W. R. Olamide, discharged the defendant of some of counts because, there was no evidence to link the cutlass found in the defendant’s house with the robbery allegation.
Olamide, therefore, sentenced the defendant to seven years imprisonment for conspiracy and 21 years imprisonment for robbery, adding that it was to run concurrently.
