Ogundeji Inquest: Magistrate Expresses Shock Over Assassination Of Witness

By Tunde Lemuel

Mr. M. K. O Fadeyi, the magistrate at the Lagos State Chief Magistrate’s Court, sitting in Yaba, expressed dismay over the killing of Miss Tunmise, who has been scheduled to appear as a witness to unravel the circumstances surrounding the death of late Mr. Abayomi Ogundeji.

He said: “That an intending witness is dead should be shocking to everybody. If Miss Tunmise can die in the circumstance we have not yet unraveled, can anyone blame other witnesses for refusing to appear before this court. I never issued a bench warrant for her summon, so I don’t understand why the police should have gone to Sagamu to bring her to Lagos.”

Mr. Bamidele Ogundeji, counsel to Ogundeji’s family, had arrived the court in the company of Miss Odunayo Ogundeji, younger sister to the late Ogundeji, to inform the court that Mr. Tunji Bolaji, Saturday Editor with The Nation newspaper and close friend to the late Ogundeji, informed him about the death of Miss Tunmise in Sagamu about two months ago.

He told the court that detectives had gone to Sagamu to bring her to Lagos. On getting to the Divisional Police Headquarters, Sagamu with her, she had refused to follow them. The DPO had to prevail on them not to force her. So they left.

The DPO later called to inform that Miss Tunmise was killed barely two hours after she left the police station in Sagamu.

While cross-examining Prof. Oladapo Obafunwa, Chief Pathologist, Mrs. Ezenwa, counsel to the police asked if the post mortem on the body of the late Ogundeji was recorded on video tape and if the police and family members were present. The investigating don said that it was not recorded on video and the police and the family members do not have to.

She also asked him what time the autopsy was carried out and the whereabouts of the bullet extracted from the deceased’s body. He responded that it was done on 20 August, 2008 between 9:30 a.m. and 12 noon and that the bullet is still in his safe custody.

He told the court that the police never invited him or the scene of evidence preserved for him to visit. “I was able to do that in the case of Awosika,” he added.

Prof. Obafunwa later informed the magistrate that he is now worried as he was asked by the police counsel about the whereabouts of the bullet. “I am worried because I overheard a discussion while I was sitting there that a witness in this case had been killed.”

Other witnesses cross-examined were Miss Odunayo Ogundeji and Police Corporal, Obeten Obeten, the Investigating Police officer at Idimu Police Station.

Miss Ogundeji, a postgraduate student at the university of Ibadan, had told the courtg that she visited her elder brother’s house at Ikotun after church service on 16 August, 2008.

“After lunch, he said he wanted to visit his friend, Uncle Tunji Bolaji, at Ikeja, asking if I was ready to go back to Alagbado so that he could drop me. We left home and when we got to Dopemu, he dropped me at Tower Aluminium around 2:30 p.m. and drove off.

“On Monday morning, my younger brother, Shola, who was staying with him, called me that I should come over. He told me that Brother Yomi did not come home the previous night and that got everybody worried including our mother who was also staying with him..

“He said they called his phone several times and it rang but nobody picked it until midnight. The person who picked it, identified himself as a policeman and said our brother fought with somebody and he was in their custody at Idimu Police Station. He said they should come to the station the following day to bail him.”

Asked if police from the Idimu Police Station or the State CID, Panti, ever visited the family during the course of their investigation, Miss Odunayo said, No.

When Obeten was cross-examined by Mr. Dare Falana, he said their DPO instructed them when they got to the scene of the incident to rush Ogundeji to the Ikeja General Hospital where he was confirmed dead.

He said: “One Alhaji Suraju Azeez Folarin came to the station at about 6:30 a.m. the following morning to complain that his Nissan Murano Jeep was snatched the previous night at gun point at Agege.

He said the robbers who were about six had taken him and his wife hostage; that they were being driven round until they got to that scene where the late Ogundeji hit their jeep with his own Kia jeep.

According to Alhaji, “One of the robbers had alighted and asked the deceased to lower the driver’s side window, which he refused. At this point, the robber shot at him.”

Falana queried the IPO why Alhaji did not report his car theft at a police station within Agege and why he had to come to Idimu Police Station. The IPO said that he (Alhaji) believed that the incident took place in Idimu.

Meanwhile, when the magistrate enquired about the ballistic examination to be done abroad from Prof. Obafemi, he told the court that he was at the Ministry of Justice and was told that the state was not ready to foot the bill for the overseas ballistic analysis. He, therefore, promised to step into the matter.

Before adjourning the case, he repeated his order of bench warrants against ACP Johnson Adenikan, former DPO at Idimu Police Station, Alhaji Suraju Folarin and his wife, Alhaja Folarin.

The case was adjourned till 9 July, 2009, for continuation of hearing.