Court jails couple, two others for trafficking in persons

The federal high court, sitting in Ibadan,  the capital of Oyo State, recently, sentenced a 37-year-old man, Mr Idowu Folorunso, and his 35-year-old wife, Mrs Titilayo Folorunso, to 14 years imprisonment, each, with hard labour. Reason: They procured and facilitated the trafficking of a woman to Libya for prostitution. The victim (name withheld) was Mrs […]

The federal high court, sitting in Ibadan,  the capital of Oyo State, recently, sentenced a 37-year-old man, Mr Idowu Folorunso, and his 35-year-old wife, Mrs Titilayo Folorunso, to 14 years imprisonment, each, with hard labour.
Reason: They procured and facilitated the trafficking of a woman to Libya for prostitution.
The victim (name withheld) was Mrs Folorunso’s friend.
 The couple was arrested in Ibadan on January 12, 2016, by the officials of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), following complaints made by the victim, who was a nursery school teacher.
She said that she was lured with the promise of a teaching job outside the country by the couple.
The victim, who was a nursing mother when the incident happened in May 2014, said that the convicted couple had deceived her into traveling with the promise of getting her a good job in Cairo, Egypt.
She said that she was told she would be helped by the couple’s sister to secure a job in Cairo.
Investigations however, revealed that the victim was taken to Tripoli, Libya, where she was forced into prostitution and all the money she earned were collected by a third party now still at large.
Delivering judgment on the case, Justice Joyce Abbdulmalik convicted the couple for procurement and facilitation of foreign travel documents for the purpose of promoting prostitution.
In another development the federal high court sitting in Abeokuta, Ogun State, has sentenced one Ebunoluwa Bankole, a 59-year-old woman, to 30 years imprisonment.
She was also ordered to pay a fine of N1m for the procurement and exportation of young Nigerian women to Libya for prostitution.
Bankole, who was convicted for committing offences contravening sections 13 (4b), 14(b) and 18 of the Trafficking In Persons (Prohibition) Enforcement and Administration Act 2015, bagged five years for each of the six offences she was convicted for.
The sentence would, however, run concurrently.
The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) received a petition from a group of solicitors and advocates of human right, on suspected human trafficking activities carried out by the suspect, her daughter Lateefat Sanni, and son-in-law, Muritala Sanni, who were both still at large.
 The petition reported that Bankole’s daughter and son in-law, based in Libya, used to collect money, ranging from the sum of N500, 000 to N1.5m, from their victims, promising to take them to countries from where they could easily secure visa to either the United Kingdom or United States of America.
Also, the federal high court, sitting in Minna, Niger State, has sentenced one Glory Abang to two years imprisonment for engaging a 12-year-old child in activities that were deemed exploitative, injurious or hazardous to her physical, social and psychological development.
Mrs Abang, mother of three, residing at Chief Palace, Goram, Niger State, was arrested by some officers of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) in July 2015.
 She took her half sister from Akwa Ibom State to Niger State under the pretext of sending her to school, but engaged her in exploitative activities, including making her sleep in a poultry facility at her residence, considered hazardous to the child’s psychological development.
The child was also not enrolled in school.
 When the lady was arraigned in recently, she pleaded guilty to the one-count charge, asking for leniency.
Delivering his judgment, Justice Y. Bogoro convicted Mrs Abang and sentenced her to two years imprisonment.