COVID-19: Lagos Attorney General digitalizes judiciary

Lagos State Government has announced the courtrooms will take delivery of audiovisual equipment that will enhance adjudication of cases amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

The Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice,  Mr Moyosore Onigbanjo, SAN, made this known at the Ministerial News Briefing to commemorate the one year anniversary of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu.

Moyosore noted that the state recorded the first virtual court session in the country in which the defendant was sentenced to death.

Mr Onigbanjo said that the ministry would gradually phase out lay Prosecutors at Magistrate Courts to ensure speedy trial and decongestion.

The Attorney-General said that in the last one year, the Office of the Public Defender, OPD, received four hundred and twenty-seven petitions, concluded eighty-five via Alternative Dispute Resolution and treated forty domestic violence cases.

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He said that the OPD visited the Correctional Centres to render free legal services to inmates and secured the release of about three hundred inmates.

The Commissioner disclosed that 2,249 offenders were sentenced to community service for various offences, including some Nollywood celebrities who violated the COVID-19 social distancing regulations, asserting that their punishment was supervised by the Ministry at various public institutions including Hospitals, Remand Homes, Traffic Management and Market sanitations.

The Commissioner also revealed that the State Domestic and Sexual Violence Response Team (DSVRT) under the review period held a series of activities to galvanise strategic action and respond appropriately to formal and informal reporting of incidents of rape, defilement, domestic violence, child abuse, neglect and maltreatment.

He said the DSVRT has also organised training for Judges and Magistrates; held a special advocacy walk, tagged “Commit and Act” against all forms of sexual and gender-based violence.

Also, he said that the Directorate of Citizen’s Rights received one thousand three hundred and eight petitions out of which one thousand and seventy were resolved while two hundred and twenty-eight are at different stages of resolution.

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE