Banker Sentenced To 39 Years In Prison For Stealing N30m From Dead Customer

Mr. Olawale Garuba.

Lagos, (AN24) – A Lagos State High Court, today, Thursday, June, 9, 2016, sentenced a banker, Mr. Olawale Garuba, to 39 years jail term for stealing from the dead.
Mr. Garuba was arraigned before Justice Oluwatoyin Ipaye alongside six others in July 2015 for conspiring among themselves to steal over N30m from the bank account of a deceased customer of a bank where the convict works
The crime committed by Mr. Garuba was uncovered by the bank when they discovered that some of their employees, including Mr. Garuba had connived with proxies to steal from a dormant account of one of the bank’s customers.
Having discovered the fraud, bank arrested the employee and handed them over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for investigation and prosecution.
Meanwhile, they pleaded not guilty to 18 counts of fraud upon their arraignment, even as Justice Ipaye refused their bail application and ordered their remand in prison custody.
However, on June 2, 2016, the Mr. Garuba changed his plea from ‘not guilty’ to ‘guilty’, with this, he was convicted by Justice Ipaye, who adjourned the case till Wednesday for sentencing.
Meanwhile, Olanrewaju Ajanaku, the counsel representing the convict, prayed the court to tamper justice with mercy in sentencing his client. He told the court that his client was a remorseful first time offender with a young wife and two little children.
But Abba Mohammed, the prosecution counsel, urged the court to consider the three-way traffic while tampering justice with mercy, adding that the interests of the court, the victim and the convict should be considered.
After listening to the arguments of the counsel, Justice Ipaye said despite the remorse shown by the convict, she has no sympathy for him as he compromised his position as a banker to steal from a deceased customer whose money would have been used by the family she left behind.
Justice Ipaye added that the convict allowed his greed to overcome him and risk losing the job that thousands of job seekers were craving.
Furthermore, Justice Ipaye found the convict guilty on 13 of the 18 counts, and sentenced him to three years imprisonment on each count. The sentences are to run concurrently from the date of his first detention, which is July 24, 2015.