Court Strikes out Charges against Amigo Supermarket Owner, Others

Symbol of justice

A chief magistrate’s court in Karu, Abuja,  Wednesday discharged the co-owner of the popular Amigo supermarket in the federal capital, Mustapha Fawaz, Abdallah Thaini, Talal Roda and Kossay Nourdin arraigned by the Department of State Security Service (SSS) for alleged unlawful importation and possession of large cache of prohibited firearms and other weapons of mass destruction discovered at a residence in Kano.

The accused are alleged to have purported links to the terrorist group, Hezbollah.

Chief Magistrate Yemi Oyeyipo also struck out the First Information Report (FIR) filed by the SSS against the Lebanese businessmen.

The court equally struck out the preliminary objection filed by the suspects’ lawyer, Ahmed Raji (SAN), on June 17, challenging the jurisdiction of the magistrate to entertain the matter.

In his dismissal of the case, the magistrate said: “Having listened to the oral application of the prosecuting counsel and the submission of the defence counsel, I hereby grant as prayed that the charge filed on the basis of First Information Report (FIR) on June 5, 2013 is hereby struck out.”

He added: “In the circumstances, the preliminary objection filed by the defence counsel is equally struck out and the accused persons are hereby discharged.”

Oyeyipo, however, did not acquit the accused persons because he had not gone into the merit of the case.

After the court's ruling, operatives of the SSS immediately matched the suspects to a waiting Peugeot Expert with Abuja registration number BWR 245 AJ and were driven back to the SSS headquarters.