Court confines farmers to two weeks community service for possession of Army uniform

In Akure, the capital of Ondo State, a magistrate’s court handed down a sentence on Monday to two farmers, Hassan Augustine, aged 55, and Felix Balogun, aged 47, for unlawfully possessing Nigerian Army uniforms.

The magistrate, O. W. Dosumu, ordered them to serve two weeks of community service at the new court complex in Oke Eda, Akure, from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. daily.

The conviction was based on the farmers’ guilty plea and the prosecution proving their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

Earlier, the prosecutor, Insp Adeboye Adesegun, had informed the court that the convicts were caught with the uniforms at Wese Camp, Ipele, Ose Local Government Area of Ondo State.

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According to him, the convicts could not give a satisfactory account of how they came about the uniforms when they were arrested.

The prosecutor, who tendered the convicts’ confessional statements and the army uniforms as exhibits, asked the court to sentence the farmers accordingly.

Adesegun added that the offences contravened sections 516 and 428 (a) and (b) of the Criminal Code Cap 33, Volume 1, Laws of Ondo State of Nigeria, 2006.