Alleged culpable homicide: Maryam Sanda knows fate Jan 27

JUSTICE Yusuf Halilu of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), sitting at Maitama, Abuja, on Monday, fixed January 27, 2020, for judgment in the alleged culpable homicide charge preferred against Maryam Sanda.

Sanda was brought before the court by the FCT Commissioner of Police for allegedly killing her husband, Bilyaminu Bello, in the night of November 18, 2017, by stabbing him with a knife and other dangerous objects.

Her late husband was a nephew of a former national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr Haliru Bello.

She has arraigned alongside her mother Maimuna Aliyu; brother, Aliyu Sanda and housemaid, Sadiya Aminu, who was arraigned for allegedly cleaning the blood of the deceased from the scene of the alleged crime.

The court, however, on April 4, discharged the co-defendants, having upheld the no-case submission made on their behalf by their counsel, Hussain Musa.

It, therefore, directed Sanda to open her defence following the failure of her no-case submission made by her counsel, Olusegun Jolaawo (SAN).

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Justice Halilu fixed the judgment date on Monday after parties adopted their respective final written addresses in the matter.

Adopting its final written address, the prosecution counsel, Fidelis Ogbobe, urged the court to convict the defendant as the prosecution had proved the allegations levelled against her beyond a reasonable doubt.

Ogbobe told the court that the prosecution had been able to establish that Sanda caused the death of the late Bilyaminu by stabbing him.

He then urged the court to, therefore, “convict the defendant and sentence her accordingly.”

In her argument, counsel for Sanda, Regina Okotie-Eboh, submitted that the prosecution failed to tender evidence to corroborate the allegations against the defendant.

According to her, the prosecution did not prove the elements of the crime, saying that it did not call nurses or doctors from the hospital where the deceased was taken to as witnesses.

Okotie-Eboh further told the court that the prosecution failed to tender the knife allegedly used by the defendant to stab the deceased.