A Delta Chief Magistrate Court sitting at the Warri Magisterial District has sentenced one Oghenekevwe Frank Atumu to seven and half years imprisonment for sending threat to life text messages to a former Delta State Commissioner, Love Ojakovo, with an intent to extort N13 million.
The Court, presided over by Chief Magistrate Ena Odjugo, found the 32-year-old accused guilty on the three count charge preffered against him by the prosecution and sentenced him to two and half years imprisonment for each of the count.
The accused, a cousin to the wife of the complainant, who is said to be jobless but claimed to be a staff of an Oil Servicing Company based in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, was said to have been allegedly rusticated from the state-owned university for cultism.
“That you, Oghenekevwe Frank Atumu(m) between 2nd and 21st May, 2013 at Warri in the Warri Magisterial District with intent to extort money from Love Okeoghene Ojakovo (m) and his wife, sent threat to life text messages to kidnap them unless the sum of N13million is paid and thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 406 of the Criminal Code Law, Cap C.21 Volume 1, Laws of Delta State of Nigeria, 2016,” count one of the charges reads.
Ojakovo, a Commissioner for Finance during the former Governor James Ibori administration, who reported receiving several threat text messages from a particular Glo line to law enforcement agents and demanding for the sum of N13 million, did not initially know that it was his wife’s cousin that was the face behind the mask until it was uncovered by operatives of the Department of State Service.
The accused made a confessional statement admitting to the offence but pleaded not guilty to the three count charge when he was arraigned before the Court for trial.
In sentencing the accused, the trial Chief Magistrate, who declined a plea for leniency by Counsel to the defendant, praying the Court to impose an option of fine, said the offence, which had become prevalent in the society today, is a foundation for the serious offence of kidnapping.
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