Headfort Foundation (Prison Reform Initiative) has rescued a man identified as David who spent eight months in prison for no just cause.
According to the foundation, David’s journey to the prison began on the 3rd of August 2022.
David, who is an hairstylist and resides in Surulere, had closed from his salon and decided to visit his friends.
While he was with his friends, they saw one of their friends in his car so they approached him and were cajoling him to give them money.
At that moment, some policemen arrived at the location, his friends ran away at the sight of the policemen, but David was arrested and taken to Itire police station.
He was later transferred to Ikeja SARS.
Two weeks later, on the 16th of August 2022, David was arraigned in court and was charged for the offence of breach of peace. The court granted him bail but he could not perfect the bail conditions, consequently causing him being remanded in prison.
He had no lawyer and could not afford one until January 2023 when Headfort Foundation’s team of lawyers from Ogba Magistrate Court were at the court cell to take up new briefs of inmates with no legal representation.
They met David and Headfort Foundation’s lawyer, Thecla Onuagu, took the case and started representing him in court.
Headfort Foundation noted that after several adjournments, police failed to come to court to give evidence against David. This prompted the lawyer to pray to the court to strike out the matter.
The application was granted on 3rd of May 2023 but at that point, David had spent 8 months and 3 weeks languishing in custody for no reason.
