TheCable

A prosecution witness in the ongoing trial of Sylvester Ngwuta, a supreme court judge, has narrated how the justice allegedly tried to move some cash discovered in his house in Abakiliki, Ebonyi state capital.

The justice is standing a 13-count charge bordering on money laundering, age falsification and possession of multiple international passports.

His home was raided by DSS operatives in October 2016, during which the security agency said it recovered the sums of N35 million; $319,596; £25,915; and €280.

In May, the DSS and the court had disagreed over the amount of money tendered as exhibit. Part of it was said to have been missing.

But at the resumed hearing on Thursday, Ibrahim Ndakpoto, the witness, informed the court that the N12,000 shortfall in money tendered as evidence was due to “human error”.

“The money was counted manually and for human beings to manually count over N4.3 million, human error can be expected,” he said.

Ndakpoto also told the court that the money was recovered in a house in Abakaliki following information received from one Linus Chukwuebuka.

He said: “Linus Chukwuebuka made revelations that necessitated our search of the house where we found documents relating to property and a bag containing the money.

“Linus told me that Justice Ngwuta called him and asked him to go to his bedroom and remove the documents and the bag containing the money and hide them because if the `SSS’ should lay eyes on it, he will be in trouble.

“He also told us that Ngwuta asked him to move some cars, a BMW, a Wrangler jeep and a Hummer jeep, and that he further asked him to disappear afterwards so that he will not be arrested.”

The judge adjourned the matter until January 12 for cross-examination of the witness by the defence team.