Justice J.A. Kereng of the Gombe State High Court sitting in Gombe, on Monday, convicted and sentenced one Ibrahim Abdullahi and Umar Usman to various jail terms for obtaining the sum of N682,847 under false pretences.
Abdullahi and Usman were arraigned on three charges of cheating and employment scam by the Gombe Zonal Command of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
The charge against Ibrahim them reads: “That you, Ibrahim Abdullahi and Umar Usman, sometime in October 2020 and January 2021 in Gombe, Gombe State within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, obtained the Polaris ATM Card properties of Aminu Adamu Idris and Muhammed Saidu Jibril, which you claimed was documentation for offer of employment you secured for them in a private liability company at Gombe, but rather used the said ATM to obtain a loan to the tune of N682,847(Six hundred and Eighty-Two Thousand, Eighty Hundred and Forty-Seven Naira only) without their consent and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 320 of the Penal Code Law and punishable under Section 322 of the same law.”
Upon arraignment, the defendants pleaded guilty to their respective charges.
Given the defendants’ pleas, prosecuting counsel, A.B. Kware prayed the court to convict and sentence them accordingly.
However, counsel to the defendants, R.A. Anthony pleaded with the court to temper justice with mercy.
“The defendants are first-time offenders who are remorseful for their actions,” Anthony said.
Justice Kereng convicted and sentenced Abdullahi to one year imprisonment with an option of a N50,000 fine, and Usman bagged two years imprisonment or a fine of N50,000.
According to the EFCC: “The convicts allegedly approached their victims in October 2022 about some phoney job opportunities in a private liability company in Gombe State.
“They directed their victims to each open an account with Polaris Bank which they did and surrendered the account details as well as their ATM Cards to them.
“The convicts, in return, gave their victims the sum of N10,000 each. After a while, the victims had issues with Polaris Bank’s transactions and went to the bank to make inquiries, only to be confronted with an outstanding loan of N682,847. All efforts to distance themselves from the loan proved abortive and they reported the case to the EFCC.”
