Bauchi Chief Judge Sets Almajiri Who Stole Rice, 3 Others Free From Prison
The Chief Judge of Bauchi State, Justice Rabi Talatu Umar, on Wednesday, set an Almajiri who stole three local measures of rice, one Auwalu Ibrahim and three other inmates awaiting trial free.
The CJ set the four awaiting trial inmates, two each from Bauchi and Ningi custodial centres free during a visit to the centres to review cases of awaiting trial inmates.
Other inmates who regained their freedom are Umar Safiyanu, Magaji Iro and Adamu Sulaiman.
While Auwalu Ibrahim and Umar Safiyanu, both of whom have spent seven months each behind bars at the Ningi Custodial Centre, Magaji Iro and Adamu Sulaiman were freed from Bauchi Custodial Centre, after spending four months each there.
Justice Umar was informed that Safiyanu was a motorcycle mechanic and was remanded for selling a motorcycle brought to him for repairs and used the proceeds for his personal gains.
The Almajiri, Ibrahim, was said to have in the course of begging stolen three mudus of rice at a house in Ningi.
After reviewing their individual cases, the CJ set the awaiting trial inmates free and admonished them to be of good character in the society.
She directed that Ibrahim, who is an indigene of Birnin Kudu in Jigawa State but came to Ningi to learn the Qur’an be returned to his hometown to find a means of livelihood there.
She also noted that those freed from Bauchi Custodial Centre have learned some trades in the course of their remand at the centre and urged them to go into the society and make a living with the respective trades they have learnt.
Speaking on the essence of her visits to the custodial centres, Justice Umar explained that the periodic visit was part of her responsibilities as the state Chief Judge to discover those who are unnecessarily detained without genuine reasons.
According to her:-
“Those two cases at the Bauchi Custodial Centres are genuine cases, the awaiting trial inmates are not supposed to be there in the first instance.
“We checked and discovered that their cases are genuine. That was why I released them.”
On the entourage of the Chief Judge to the custodial centres across the state were the State Controller of the Nigeria Correctional Services, Isa Sabo Kashuri and state Chairman, Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), Abubakar Abdulhamid, among others.
