BRAVE DICKSON
A cocaine suspect by name,Nicholas Thompson who was arrested by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency immediately after three packs of cocaine, heroine and cannabis were allegedly recovered from his residence in Port Harcourt has denied making a voluntary statement before the officials of NDLEA.
The prosecution witness and Deputy Superintendent of Narcotics, Rivers State Command, James Awoji who led the arrest of the suspect told a federal high court in Port Harcourt that the seized packs of cocaine weighed 15.4 grams, heroine 5.8 grams and cannabis 2.6 grams respectively.
“We got an information that the defendant deals on hard drugs. I led a team of operatives to his residence at 5am. We met him at home and told him our mission to search is residence. While carrying out the search, we recovered some substances that proved positive of cocaine, heroine and cannabis”, the prosecution witness said.
Counsel to the defendant, Allwell Ezebunwo who maintained that his client, Nicholas Thompson gave statement before NDLEA in duress urged the court to make an order of trial-within-trial.
The defence counsel said, “we will not object to the packs of substances alleged to the illicit drugs which the prosecution said my client was caught with because at the appropriate time, proofs will determine such.
“But we are objecting to the claims by the prosecution that my client gave a voluntary confessional statement. We were pleased as the court granted our prayers to subject the said statement under trial-within-trial on next adjournment”.
On her part, lawyer to NDLEA, Bridget Viashima expressed optimism that verdict at the end of the trial will favour the anti illicit drug agency, adding that substantial evidence are before the court in support of the prosecution.
Our correspondent reports that the court has adjourned the case till the 27th of November, 2018 for trial- within-trial after it marked the packs of cocaine as exhibit A, heroine as exibit B and cannabis as exibit C.
