Trail Reporters
In defiance to the anti-corruption fight of the Buhari’s administration, corruption has continued to eat deep into the hierachy of the police as Commissioner of Police, CP Surajudeen O. Umar in charge of Legal and Prosecution Section Force Headquarters Abuja exonerates high profile corruption suspects of various crimes ranging from kidnapping, fraud, forgery, armed robbery/cultism/unlawful possession of firearms, as Commissioner of Police in charge of Legal Force Headquarters Abuja, CP Surajudeen O. Umar is alleged to have collected bribe to the tune of N6 Million naira to write a favourable Legal Advice to Mrs Clara Sogbaike & others who are suspects in a case file he handled, sources quoted. Recollect that, the Rector of Delta State Polytechnic Oghara, Clara Sogbaike and her cohorts has been under investigation by the Inspector General of Police via the National Security Adviser to the President.
Findings by our reporters revealed that, CSP Dalatu Usman was initially detailed to investigate the case since December 2015. CSP Dalatu Usman compromised when he failed to arrest the suspects after they disobeyed police invitations and instead, they traveled to Delta State and obtained statements in the offices of the suspects. Their expenses were taken care of by the same suspects they were investigating.
This marked the beginning of a corrupt romance between CSP Dalatu and the suspects. After Dalatu collected statements from the suspects in Delta State, since January 2016, he never carried out any further investigation because he was feeding fat on the suspects. After one year, the complainant noticed so many foul played by CSP Dalatu, the complainant petitioned to the CP IGP Monitoring Unit against CSP Dalatu on the 5th of December, 2016 and the IGP was copied.
As a result of the petition, CSP Dalatu Usman was directed by his CP, Garba Baba Umar to hand over the case file and exhibits to Team A leader, IGP Monitoring Unit, CSP Imram Balarebe for further investigations. We gathered that, CSP Dalatu in a bid to save his job over corruption allegations and negligence of duty, hurriedly duplicated the case file which he failed to investigate and never granted any interview with the suspects and the complainant before he wrote a biased report to CP Legal for advice after he had threatened to deal with the complainant for daring to expose him.
CSP Dalatu only succeeded in taking over a case file with exhibits of bullets, Eiye confraternity cult beret, daggers and other dangerous weapons recovered from Engr. Dickson Eghwatore, who is currently the Director of Projects in Delta State Polytechnic Oghara, from Federal SARS, but deliberately refused to take over the original case file from the office of the Deputy Inspector General of Police Force Criminal Investigation & Intelligence Department being handled by CP General Investigation, which contained statements of suspects, complainant, witnesses and several police reports.
Trail Reporters gathered that, crack team of detectives were prevented from investigating and arresting Clara Sogbaike and her cohorts as a result of a court restraining order filed by the suspects, Clara Sogbaike and her cohorts against the Inspector General of Police and Commissioner of Police Delta State since 2014 till date which the same police deliberately refused to vacate till date because of corruption until recently the Deputy Inspector General of Police, DIG Hyacinth Dagala in charge of FCIID Abuja directed the CP General Investigation FCIID, CP Lawal Ado to duplicate the case file to CP Legal Force Headquarters Abuja to vacate the court order against the Police. Reports reaching our news desk reveals that the order of the DIG FCIID has been complied with and was forwarded to the office of the CP Legal on 7th of March, 2017, for the court order to be vacated to enable a thorough investigation commence and be concluded into all the allegations against the suspects, Clara Sogbaike and her cohorts.
The New Investigative Police Officer, SP England Doris attached to the IGP Monitoring Unit, who took over the case file from CSP Dalatu Usman on the directives of CP Garba Baba Umar in charge of IGP Monitoring Unit, refused to further investigate after perusing through the case files stating reasons that she had been directed to wait for the Legal advice hurriedly forwarded to CP Legal by CSP Dalatu Usman with Reference No. CR: 3100/IGP SEC/MU/T.D/VOL. 11/141 while also awaiting for the original Case file of the same suspects in the office of DIG FCIID to be forwarded to CP Legal for necessary actions.
However, SP England Doris after perusing through the case files, including the cultism/unlawful possession of firearms, she noted and pointed out some anomalies due to shoddy investigations carried out by CSP Usman Dalatu & Team.
Findings by our reporters reveals that, while waiting for the bias report forwarded by CSP Dalatu to CP Legal, the complainant, Mr. Osiobe Ovie received a Fundamental Human Fights Suit through his lawyer filed by the same suspects, Clara Sogbaike & her cohorts against the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, EFCC Chairman, EFCC South South Zonal Head, Port Harcourt, Chairman, Code of Conduct Bureau, Executive Secretary, National Human Rights Commission and the Complainant, Mr. Osiobe F. Ovie, asking a Federal High Court 2, Asaba, Delta State to restrain the Nigerian President and six other Respondents from investigating and arresting them over alleged massive fraud.
Surprisingly, with evidence of the suit filed against the Nigerian President and six others by Clara and her cohorts, paragraphs 43 & 50 of the Suit showed that Clara Sogbaike and others were exonerated of all allegations against them through a Legal Advice with Reference No. CB: 3514/X/LEG/FHQ/ABJ/VOL.31/25 forwarded by CP Legal to the Inspector- General of Police with part of the date cleverly wipe off, with the remaining part showing February, 2017.
We also observed that the Legal Advice was signed by CP Surajudeen O. Umar in charge of Legal/Prosecution Section Force Headquarters Abuja, recommending that the complainant should be arraigned in Court for giving police false information which is not true, even when the case file forwarded from CP G.I FCIID on the directives of DIG Dagala Hyacinth is before the CP Legal directing him to vacate a Court order filed against the Inspector General of Police by the same suspects, Clara Sogbaike and others over the same subject matter, which the police failed to vacate since September, 2014 till date as a result of systemic corruption among some corrupt officers within the Police Force.
Speaking with Trail Reporters, Mr. Osiobe raised the following questions which are begging for answers from CP Legal, CP Surajudeen O. Umar, CSP Dalatu Usman and the Police Authority;
1. How did CP Legal arrive at a conclusion that Clara & others accused of fraud were innocent without requesting and obtaining bank statements of account, both personal and public to detect, fraudulent transactions?
2. Who should be responsible for requesting bank statements of account? The complainant, suspects or the Police?
3. Why did CP legal blame the complainant for not having bank statements of account in a case file duplicated and forwarded to him by the IPO, CSP Dalatu Usman in a case of allegations of fraud?
4. Why did CP Legal and CSP Dalatu Usman base their exoneration of the suspects based on the report of the Auditor General Of Delta State not complaining of fraud over the polytechnic? Who by law is empowered to investigate financial crimes? The Auditor General or the Police?
5. Why did CP Legal and CSP Dalatu Usman exonerate the suspects especially Engr. Dickson Eghwatore of armed robbery, cultism and unlawful possession of firearms? Where are the exhibits of bullets, Eiye Cult Beret, daggers and other dangerous weapons CSP took over from Federal SARS, particularly from ASP Friday Nwakama?
Where are the three statements of Engr. Dickson Eghwatore, the one he wrote in Oghara division on October 8th 2014, the one he wrote to Federal SARS on 22nd October, 2015 and the last one he wrote to IGP Monitoring Unit February 3rd/4th 2016?
6. Did Engr. Dickson in his confessional statements in Delta State and Federal SARS, except yours, not confess to being a member of Eiye Confraternity and accepted giving bullets to one Gregory who also made statements in Oghara division and also confessed being a member of Eiye cult? Why did CP Legal and CSP Dalatu Usman exonerate Dickson of all allegations? Why was Dickson not charged for cultism,unlawful possession of life cartridges and belonging to an unlawful society?
7. Why was Gregory who indicted Dickson as his supplier of bullets and Engr. Dickson was never rearrested by CSP Dalatu Usman? Why did Oghara Police division, Delta state, Federal SARS and IGP Monitoring Unit fail to recover the guns with which the bullets are used for? Or are the life bullets used by the suspects to shoot catapult?
8. Why did CP Legal, Surajudeen O. Umar and CSP Dalatu Usman exonerate Engr. Dickson Eghwatore of any crime in his Legal Advice to IGP, stating that the other four students Gregory, Daniel, Sophia and one other person who committed the crime had long been charged to court? Which court within Delta State where they charged to? Which police formation charged them to court? Where is a copy of their charge sheet? What is the situation of the case at the moment? What is CSP Dalatu still doing with the exhibits of bullets, cult beret, daggers and dangerous weapons recovered from the students they claimed had long been charged to court?Why did CSP Dalatu not take over the case file from the office of DiG FCIID to harmonise and consolidate before forwarding his duplicate case file to CP Legal for Advice?
Why did CSP Dalatu not grant any interview between the complainant and suspects for over one year after statements of the complainant, suspects and witnesses were obtained before he hurriedly duplicated the case file and his biased report to CP Legal after the complainant had petitioned him to his CP in charge of IGP Monitoring Unit and he had been directed to hand over the case files to a new Team leader, CSP Imram Balabere?,
9. What are the findings and report of the New Team leader, CSP Imram Balarebe and the new IPO, SP England Doris?
10. Is it right for CP Surajudeen O. Umar and CSP Dalatu Usman to release Police official Legal Advice and police report to the suspects purportedly exonerating them of fraud and other crimes with which they have sued the Nigerian President and six others including EFCC which have already established a prima facie case against the same suspects of massive embezzlement , contrary to Police Legal Advice and Report which exonerated them of fraud.
Raising issues of great concern, the complainant claimed that there are plots by the suspects in connivance with some corrupt police officers to arrest and murder him while he is in detention in order to scuttle investigation of other anti graft agencies against the suspects. The action of CP Legal and CSP Dalatu portends serious danger as justice is now only for the highest bidder in the Legal department Force Headquarters, Abuja. As at the time of filing this reports, documents in our position shows that the Presidency and the IGP has officially be communicated on the worrisome development for urgent action to forestall a breakdown of law and order.
A senior police officer who spoke with Trail Reporters confirmed that, it was wrong to have leaked the documents to the parties.
CSP Usman Dalatu of Force Headquarters the heavily compromised officer is at it again. I have a story against him. he is always shielding criminals