The Osun State High Court has firmly dismissed allegations that it sentenced two young men, Olowookere Segun and Sunday Morakinyo, to death for stealing a fowl.
The court clarified that the convicts were found guilty of armed robbery and not petty theft, countering the distorted narrative widely circulated in the media.
In a statement titled “Setting the Record Straight” issued on December 20, 2024, by the court registrar, Omisade F. I., it was explained that the duo’s trial, conducted between February 2013 and December 2014, involved multiple counts of armed robbery.
The statement partly read, “In line with the recommendations of the State Advisory Council on the Prerogative of Mercy, Governor Ademola Adeleke has exercised the prerogative of mercy towards 53 convicts serving various convictions within the Nigerian Correctional Service.
“Now know ye therefore that, I, Senator Ademola Jackson Adeleke, the Governor of Osun State of Nigeria, in exercise of the power conferred on me by paragraph (a), (c) and (d) of subsection (i) of Section 212 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as Amended), I am pleased to extend my grace and mercy unto the said inmates.
“Convicts recommended for outright pardon for good conduct (capital offences) are: Sunday Morakinyo, Segun Olowookere, Tunde Olapade and Demola Odeyemi.”
Responding to public outrage, the court clarified that Olowookere and his accomplice, Morakinyo, were convicted and sentenced to death by hanging for armed robbery by the High Court of Justice, Ikirun Judicial Division, presided over by Hon. Justice S.O. Falola.
The statement read, “The succinct fact of this case was that the boy, Olowookere, and one other person, Morakinyo Sunday, were going about in Oyan town and its neighbourhood robbing innocent and unsuspecting people at gunpoint.
“Luck ran out on them in April 2010 when they were caught in action while robbing a poultry. Arms were recovered from them. They equally confessed to committing several armed robberies.
“The facts of the case have been distorted and maliciously misrepresented to the generality of the people. What has been laid before the public domain is that this boy was convicted and sentenced to death for stealing one fowl.
“An educated person does not need to be a lawyer before being well informed to know as a fact that a person cannot be sentenced to death for stealing a fowl, not even N1bn, without being armed at the time of committing the crime.”
Clarifying details about the defendants’ ages, the statement revealed that Olowookere was 17 years old at the time of his arrest in 2010, contrary to claims that he was a minor while his accomplice, Sunday, was 18 years old at the time of arrest and trial.
“The said Olowookere, the first accused person in suit No. HKK/2/2012, was 17 years old at the time of the trial, which has been blown out of proportion and is nothing but nauseating falsehood.
“He was in fact 17 years old at the time he was arrested and made to stand trial. His extrajudicial statement and the information upon which they were tried attest to this. The second accused person, Morakinyo, was 18 years old as at that time.
“What is more, his age or that of the second accused person was never an issue before the court at any stage of the trial. It is, therefore, a desperate design to whip up underserved sentiment.”
The court added, “The entire scenario woven around this case has been skewed to malign the personality of the trial judge and denigrate the Osun State High Court as an institution.
“The trial judge, in His Lordship’s characteristic magnanimity, large heart, and fatherly disposition, did what the law prescribed and went further to recommend them for the mercy of the governor.”
