Justice Rahman Oshodi of the Lagos State Special Offences Court has admitted a certified true copy of a Supreme Court judgment in evidence during the trial of Godwin Emefiele, the former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, overruling defence objections. Emefiele faces a 19-count charge involving alleged gratification, corrupt demands and abuse of office, relating to transactions valued at 4.5 billion US dollars and 2.8 billion naira. His co-defendant, Henry Omoile, is standing trial on a three-count charge of alleged unlawful acceptance of gifts.
The defence had raised two preliminary objections to admitting the judgment as evidence. Olekan Ojo, counsel for Emefiele, argued that findings in civil forfeiture proceedings could not be used to establish guilt in a criminal trial, citing principles of evidence law that prevent civil judgments from being used to prove the ingredients of a criminal offence. Adeyinka Kotoye, counsel for Omoile, raised additional concerns that the judgment came after criminal proceedings had commenced and was not included in the proof of evidence as required by the Administration of Criminal Justice Act.
Oshodi ruled that a Supreme Court judgment is a public document and that a certified true copy is admissible as secondary evidence under law. He noted that the defence had been duly served with the document on 12 November. The judge relied on Court of Appeal precedent in Matthias v. Shiki and Others, where a certified true copy containing only the lead judgment was admitted, and cited a Supreme Court ruling that the lead judgment alone constitutes the legal judgment of the court.
On the issue of using a civil judgment in criminal proceedings, Oshodi held that court judgments when admitted are used only to establish what was actually decided in a previous case, not to use evidence given in that case for or against any party in current proceedings. He cited Supreme Court decisions in David v. Friyisi Akperen and other cases to support this principle. The judge admitted the judgment as Exhibit L, emphasising it would not be used as evidence for or against any party in the criminal case.
EFCC prosecutor Rotimi Oyedepo had urged the court to admit the document as a certified true copy of a Supreme Court judgment complying with the Evidence Act, arguing that the purpose for which a document would be used could not render an otherwise admissible document inadmissible. Following the ruling, the trial continued with cross-examination of Alvan Gurumnaan, the lead investigator who headed a 10-man special operations team. Gurumnaan, a lawyer called to the Nigerian Bar in 2006, disclosed that he had personally interviewed the former Managing Director of Zenith Bank, Ebenezer Onyeagwu, and that the investigation team had interviewed hundreds of people including the defendants, Central Bank of Nigeria staff and commercial bank officials.