25th January, 2012
A Federal High Court sitting in Ikoyi, Lagos State, has sentenced an electrician, Adeniran Sikiru Adekunle, 39, to three years imprisonment over a case of unlawful possession of fake cheques for payment in foreign currencies.
In a summary trial, Adekunle pleaded guilty to an amended three-count charge preferred against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, upon which Justice Tsoho pronounced him guilty as charged and sentenced him accordingly.
Trouble started for Adekunle in February, 2010 when he was arrested by operatives of the State Security Service, (SSS) at the check-in counter of Ethiopian Airways at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Ikeja , Lagos in possession of 1,928 cheques of various banks suspected to be fake.
Adekunle and the exhibits were transferred to the EFCC for investigation and prosecution.
The convict, an electrician turned fraudster, who was on his way to India concealed the fake cheques in a bag stuffed with varied food items to beat the security at the airport.
He claimed that the fake instruments were given to him by a man called Kenny, a friend of his younger brother to help deliver to Zezeu in India .
Upon arrest, Adekunle could not provide further information about the purported Kenny which made his claims spurious.
He later made statement under caution confessing to be in possession of the said counterfeit cheques and had to voluntarily plead guilty to the charges against him and was convicted after a summary trial.