The Yaba Magistrates’ court on Monday remanded three suspected cultists for alleged murder, robbery and unlawful possession of arms.
They were accused of killing one Victor Isa.
The defendants, Balogun Ahmed, Kareem Sanni, and Shina Bankole were arraigned before Magistrate L. Y. Balogun on six counts of illegal possession of a shotgun, theft, murder and belonging to an unlawful group known as the Eiye confraternity preferred against them by the Lagos State Police Command.
The prosecutor, ASP Chekwube Okeh, told the court that the defendants committed the offence in December 2022, and April 2023 respectively.
According to Okeh, the defendants, on April 2, 2023, around 10pm at Saliu Obodo Street, Oke-Ira, Eti-Osa, Lagos shot and killed one Victor Isa with a locally-made pistol.
The charge read in part, “That you, Balogun Ahmed, Kareem Sanni, and Shina Bankole, and others at large on April 2, 2023, at Oke-Ira, Lagos in the Lagos Magisterial District were found to be members of the dreaded Eiye confraternity which is an unlawful society prohibited by the Lagos State Government and thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 2(3) (a) of the Unlawful Societies and Cultism Prohibition Laws of Lagos State, Nigeria, 2015.”
However, the defendants’ pleas were not taken.
The prosecutor then requested that the defendants be remanded pending the completion of the investigation and legal advice from the Directorate of Public Prosecution.
The magistrate granted the request and remanded the defendants.
Balogun then adjourned the case till June 6, 2023.
