Kidnap Kingpin, Evans’ Lawyer Arrested In Court

Agency ReporterSeptember 12, 2018

0 1 minute read

The Nigeria Police Force has arrested a former counsel of alleged kidnap kingpin, Chukwudumeme Onwuamadike, aka Evans.

The lawyer, Olukoya Ogungbeje, was arrested on Wednesday at the premises of the Federal High Court In Ikoyi, Lagos.

Operatives from the State Criminal Investigation Department in Panti, Yaba, swooped on the lawyer as he made to park his car at the court’s car park.

Ogungbeje, who was billed to appear before the vacation judge, Justice Muslim Hassan, was immediately whisked off by the policemen.

Ogungbeje had dumped Evans in June of this year, claiming the case exposed him to threat.

“For the avoidance of doubt, we wish to state categorically that we have fought a good fight this far despite repeated and sustained threats to my life and my defence lawyers, I dare say we have no regrets whatsoever having conducted the Criminal charges involving our client this far,” the lawyer said at the time.

Ogungbeje is famous for stepping in to defend controversial cases.

In April, he filed a suit asking the Federal High Court to stay proceedings on the forfeiture of $43,449,947 (about N13 billion), N23,218,000 and £27,800 (about N10.6 million) found in a flat in Ikoyi, Lagos.

During the hearing, the presiding judge, Justice Muslim Hassan, threw out Ogungbeje’s application describing him as a meddlesome interloper and a busybody whose application was strange to law.

Similarly, in 2014, Ogungbeje filed a suit in Lagos, asking for the reinstatement of Murtala Nyako as governor of Adamawa State. This was after Nyako was impeached by the state assembly in July of the same year and the speaker of the state assembly had taken over.

This pursuits also hit a dead end.