The Delta North Senatorial District’s Peter Nwaoboshi was found guilty of money laundering on Friday by the Court of Appeal Lagos Division and given a seven-year prison sentence.
The court also mandated that his two businesses, Suiming Electrical Ltd. and Golden Touch Construction Project Ltd., be dissolved following Section 22 of the Money Laundering Prohibition Act 2021.
The decision was reached in response to an appeal filed to overturn Justice Chukwujekwu Aneke’s Federal High Court decision, which on June 18, 2018, exonerated Nwaoboshi of a two-count allegation of fraud and money laundering.
The three defendants were charged by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) with purchasing Guinea House, Marine Road, Apapa, Lagos, for N805 million. It was claimed that N322 million, or a portion of the money delivered to the vendor, was part of the profits of fraud and was transferred by Suiming Electrical Ltd on behalf of Nwaoboshi and Golden Touch Construction Project Ltd.
But in his ruling, Justice Aneke found that the prosecution had neglected to present tangible evidence and important witnesses to establish the elements of the offenses for which it had charged the defendants.
In a statement posted on Friday on its official Twitter account, the EFCC stated that Justice Aneke had stated that PW2’s evidence indicated that the third defendant received a loan of N1.2 billion from Zenith Bank for the acquisition of additional equipment and as a provision of operating capital.
The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge erred in dismissing the charges against the respondents in its judgment on the EFCC’s appeal on Friday. It stated that the defendants were found guilty as charged because the prosecution had established all elements of the crime.
