Kyari's Bail Bid Rejected for Third Time in Two Years
Abba Kyari's bail request denied for the third time in two years, citing 'drug trafficking' concerns. The suspended DCP has been in detention since February 2022, with the court citing witness intimidation and severity of charges as reasons for denial.
Abba Kyari, the suspended deputy commissioner of police (DCP), has been denied bail by a federal high court in Abuja.
Following his NDLEA declaration of want due to suspected ties to a global narcotics gang, Kyari was taken into custody on February 14, 2022.
Kyari was arraigned on March 7, 2022, along with the police intelligence response team members Sunday Ubia, Bawa James, Simon Agirigba, and John Nuhu (IRT).
In addition, two suspected drug traffickers were detained at Akanu Ibiam International Airport in Enugu: Chibunna Patrick Umeibe and Emeka Alphonsus Ezenwanne.
Kyari and the other four defendants entered not guilty pleas at their arraignment.
However the sixth and seventh defendants, Umeibe and Ezenwanne, entered guilty pleas and were found guilty as a result.
The defendants' requests for bail have now been denied.
The defendants claimed that criminals apprehended by Kyari's team were endangering their lives, and the presiding court denied their request for release a second time.
Kyari's bail application was likewise denied by the Abuja court of appeals.
The suspended DCP was recently given a two-week bail by the court to finish the last rituals for his mother Yachilla Kyari, who passed away on May 5.
Kyari has submitted a second bail application.
According to his submission, on March 7, he had been in pre-trial imprisonment for two years, significantly longer than the one year allowed for “exceptional circumstances” in the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, even for someone facing capital charges.
Additionally, he contended that since 15 of the 16 witnesses for the prosecution had testified, the court's earlier justification for refusing him bail—that he might intimidate the witnesses—is no longer valid.
He added that it is against his fundamental human rights to be held in detention indefinitely.
“The question begging for an answer at this juncture is, having addressed these issues in the court rulings of 28th of March, 2022 and 30th of August, 2022, what has changed to distort my findings in the two rulings?” the judge asked.
The presiding judge, Emeka Nwite, said in her verdict on Wednesday that the defendants had not presented the court with enough evidence.
According to Nwite, the court's discretion is still available during a criminal trial and can be used in accordance with each case's merits.
The judge ruled that even though Kyari had mentioned in his affidavit that the trial had lasted two years and that the prosecution had brought fifteen of its sixteen witnesses, the applicant's cited Section 161 (2)(b)(c) exclusively addressed capital offenses.
He said that Section 161(2)(b)(c) provisions were not broken if Section 161 were compared to Section 35(1) of the 1999 Constitution.
“Section 35(1) states that a person who is charged with an offence and has been detained in lawful custody and awaiting trial shall not continue to be kept in such detention for a period higher than the maximum period of imprisonment,” the judge said.
“It is not in dispute that the offence which the 1st defendant/applicant is charged carried a maximum punishment of 25 years.”
Nwite continued, stating that nothing had changed dramatically in his opinion after addressing the points raised in his previous rulings.
The judge gave the order to expedite the trial's hearing.
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