The prosecution in the ongoing trial of six men accused of complicity in a plot to topple the President Bola Tinubu-led administration has urged a Federal High Court in Abuja to admit in evidence the statements made to investigators by the accused persons.
The fourth witness for the prosecution, in the trial-within-trial being conducted to ascertain the voluntariness or otherwise of the statements, made the request while telling the court that the statements were voluntarily made by the defendants, who he said were not subjected to any form of torture or harassment.
The witness, identified as “DDD”, was led in evidence by the prosecuting lawyer, Rotimi Oyedepo (SAN), during which he denied all the allegations by the defendants, including claims that they were tortured into making the statements in which five of them, except the first defendant, admitted knowing about the plot.
On the claim by the defendants that their feet were chained, the witness said: “It is not true. The feet of the defendants were not chained. They walked into the interview room by themselves.”
He said if it were true that they were chained, the sound of the chains would have been heard in the video that was played in court earlier on Tuesday.
On why their lawyers were not present while they were being interviewed, the witness said none of them requested to have either their lawyers, family members, officials of the Legal Aid Council or a Justice of the Peace (JP) present.
The witness urged the
