The police on Wednesday told the independent investigative panel on human rights violations by the defunct SARS and other police units set up by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) that it (panel) lacked the power to investigate a decision of a competent court of jurisdiction.
The lead counsel for the police, James Idachaba, said this while arguing his final written address in a petition, marked 2020/IIP-SARS/ABJ/73, filed by Mrs Nnnena Alozie, on behalf of her husband, John Emeka Alozie, alleging his arbitrary arrest, enforced disappearance and detention.
The petitioner joined ASP M.Obiozor of the defunct SARS Awkuzu, Anambra State; Uzi Emeana; Sunday Okpe, Anambra State Commissioner of Police and the Inspector-General of Police.
Idachaba, a Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP), told the panel, which was presided over by Dr Garba Tetengi SAN, on behalf of the chairman, Justice Suleiman Galadima (retd), that the matter had been settled by a court of competent jurisdiction even based on the evidence before the panel.
According to him, what was, therefore, left was for the petitioner to enforce the court decision, adding that what the petitioner was trying to achieve was to seek a review of the court’s decision.
He further said that the petitioner ought to have approached the court to enforce whatever was its decision, declaring, “What he does is forum shopping.
“When such is the case, it is wrong to repeat the same matter in another setting like the panel.
“This panel does not have the power to review whatever a court of competent jurisdiction decided.
“Once it is brought to the notice of the panel that a subject matter has been decided by the court, the panel has no power to deal with such matter again.”
Idachaba declared that any attempts by the panel to decide on such a matter meant that it (panel) was reviewing the decision of the court, adding that the court had its own way of enforcing its own decision.
He, therefore, urged the panel to dismiss the claims of the petitioner because it would amount to flagrant abuse of court processes.
Earlier, a member of the panel’s legal team, Afolabi Olawale, while adopting his final written address in the petition, urged the panel to grant the reliefs sought by the petitioner.
Meanwhile, after listening to the arguments of both sides, the panel adjourned the petition for its report.
While testifying before the panel on December 2, 2021, Mrs Alozie had alleged that six SARS operatives stormed their residence in Lekki, Lagos, on June 15, 2017, and whisked her husband away, adding that since that day she had neither known his whereabouts nor seen him.
According to her, while searching for her husband, she got to know that her husband was arrested for his involvement in an alleged kidnapping.
“After the SARS operatives arrested my husband, they ransacked our bedroom and went away with some of our personal belongings, which include certificates and other documents, money, a Lexus and a Ford, parked in our house,” she had told the panel.
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