{"id":112873,"date":"2024-06-28T22:01:24","date_gmt":"2024-06-28T21:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=112873"},"modified":"2024-06-28T22:01:24","modified_gmt":"2024-06-28T21:01:24","slug":"n25-7bn-fraud-scourt-affirms-six-year-jail-for-ex-bank-phb-md-atuche","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/pointblanknews-investigations\/n25-7bn-fraud-scourt-affirms-six-year-jail-for-ex-bank-phb-md-atuche\/","title":{"rendered":"N25.7bn fraud: S\u2019Court affirms six-year jail for ex-Bank PHB MD, Atuche"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
A five-member panel of the Supreme Court on Friday upheld the conviction and six-year jail term slammed on a former Managing Director of the now defunct Bank PHB, Francis Atuche, by the Court of Appeal, Lagos Division.<\/div>\n
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\nThe appellate court in Lagos had, in an appeal marked CA\/LA\/CR\/668\/2021, upheld the judgment delivered by the Lagos State High Court in charge number ID\/154c\/2011 on June 16, 2021.<\/p>\n

The Court of Appeal had affirmed Atuche\u2019s conviction on a 27-count in which he and two others were accused of engaging in about N25.7 billion fraud.<\/p>\n

The appellate court, however, reduced the 12-year sentence earlier slammed on Atuche by the Lagos State High Court to six years.<\/p>\n

At Friday\u2019s proceeding, the apex court in its judgment, declared that the \u201cjudgment of the Appeal Court is hereby affirmed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The court, in the lead judgment prepared by Justice Habeeb Abiru, but read by Justice Moore Adumein in the appeal marked SC\/CR\/1223\/2023 and filed by Atuche, held that the appeal was without merit.<\/p>\n

The apex court held that the appellant failed to show why it should tamper with the concurrent findings of the two lower courts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere the finding of a trial court on the demeanour of a witness is supported by oral and documentary evidence tendered at the trial, as in the present case, an appellate court has no business tampering with the decision of the trial court.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis court has not been given any reason to tamper with the concurrent findings of the two lower courts in this appeal<\/p>\n

\u201cThis appeal is lacking in merit. This appeal fails and it is hereby dismissed,\u201d it stated.<\/p>\n

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission had prosecuted Atuche, his wife, Elizabeth and a former Chief Financial Officer of the defunct bank, Ugo Anyanwu before Justice Lateefat Okunnu of the Lagos State High Court.<\/p>\n

Okunnu, in a judgment on June 16, 2021, convicted Atuche and Anyanwu on 21 out of the 27 counts of amended charges of conspiracy to commit a felony and stealing brought against them by the EFCC.<\/p>\n

The judge subsequently sentenced Atuche to 12 years and Anyanwu to 10 years imprisonment.<\/p>\n

Okunnu later discharged and acquitted Atuche\u2019s wife because the prosecution failed to link her to the crime.<\/p>\n

She held that suspicion, no matter how strong, cannot take the place of fact.<\/p>\n

The judge held that it was not proven that she was aware of the source of the funds she received in her bank account from her husband and she had no powers to take any decision to influence the transaction.<\/p>\n

While the appellate court reduced Atuche\u2019s sentence to six years, it reduced Anyanwu\u2019s sentence to eight years and upheld the discharge and acquittal of Atuche\u2019s wife.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A five-member panel of the Supreme Court on Friday upheld the conviction and six-year jail term slammed on a former Managing Director of the now defunct Bank PHB, Francis Atuche,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":80477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-pointblanknews-investigations"],"yoast_head":"\nN25.7bn fraud: S\u2019Court affirms six-year jail for ex-Bank PHB MD, Atuche - Pointblank News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/pointblanknews-investigations\/n25-7bn-fraud-scourt-affirms-six-year-jail-for-ex-bank-phb-md-atuche\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"N25.7bn fraud: S\u2019Court affirms six-year jail for ex-Bank PHB MD, Atuche - 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