Wednesday, 9 November 2016

Supreme Court Justice Busted In Money Laundering and Age Falsification (Details)

The Federal Government on Tuesday filed 6 counts, including money laundering against a Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Sylvester Ngwuta, at the Federal High Court in Abuja.

He was accused of retaining in his residence N35,358,000; $319,596 and £25,915 during the raid on his house by the operatives of the Department of State Services between October 7 and 8.

The office of the Attorney General of the Federation, which filed the charges on Tuesday, described the huge sums of money “as proceeds of unlawful activity”.

A highly-competent source told Punch that charges would also be filed against some of the judges under probe before the end of this week.

The offences captured in counts one to three are said to be contrary to Section 15 (2) (d) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act 2011 (as amended) and punishable under Section 15 (3) of the same Act.

Apart from money laundering, Justice Ngwuta is also accused of being in possession of two valid Diplomatic Passports, an offence contrary to Section 10 (1) (a) of the Immigration Act 2015.

The Supreme Court Justice is also accused of “knowingly” making a false statement to the Passport Office concerning his date of birth for the purpose of procuring an additional Diplomatic Passport for himself in violation of Section 10 (1)(c) of the Immigration Act.

He is accused of submitting multiple application forms to one or more passport offices with the intention of obtaining multiple Diplomatic Passports for himself in violation of Section 10 (1) (d) of the Immigration Act 2015 and punishable under Section 10 (1) of the same Act.

The office of the Attorney General of the Federation filed the charges before the Federal High Court.

Justice Ngwuta is among the judges whose houses were raided by the operatives of the DSS.

The DSS said it discovered large sums of money in foreign and local currencies in the raided houses.

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