The scheduled arraignment of the
Registered Trustees of the Synagogue Church Of All Nations, founded by
Prophet T.B. Joshua, was further stalled on Friday due to the
prosecution’s failure to serve the court processes on the 4th and 5th
defendants in the case.
The defendants were charged with 111
counts of manslaughter and building without approval in connection with
the death of 116 persons in the collapsed SCOAN’s six-storey building on
September 12, 2014.
Charged alongside the Registered
Trustees of SCOAN are Hardrock Construction and Engineering Company;
Jandy Trust Limited; and two engineers, Mr. Oladele Ogundeji and Mr.
Akinbela Fatiregun, who constructed the collapsed building.
The trial judge, Justice Lateef
Lawal-Akapo of a Lagos State High Court in Ikeja, had on November 30
directed the service of the charge on the 3rd, 4th and 5th defendants
and adjourned till Friday for the arraignment.
But at the resumed proceedings on
Friday, the prosecution, led by the Lagos State Director of Public
Prosecutions, Mrs. Idowu Alakija, said it found it impossible to effect
service on the engineers despite being supplied with their addresses by
one of the defence counsel, Mr. Oluseun Abimbola.
Alakija consequently informed the court
that the prosecution had filed an ex parte application seeking for an
order of substituted service on the engineers.
After she canvassed argument in support
of the application, Justice Lawal-Akapo granted it and ordered the
court’s sheriff to paste the court processes on the front doors of the
defendants’ addresses in the Alagbado and Ikeja areas of Lagos,
respectively.
The judge ordered the prosecution to
file photographic evidence featuring the sheriff pasting the court
papers at the addresses of the engineers.
By the consent of all the parties, the judge adjourned the matter till January 19, 2016.
Earlier at the proceedings, the counsel
for SCOAN, Chief Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), who led 17 other lawyers, had
informed the court that his client had an application challenging the
court’s jurisdiction and seeking to quash the charges.
He had argued that it was important for the court to entertain the application before doing any other thing.
But the judge, in a short ruling, said
he had noted the application and would hear it at the appropriate time,
adding that the fundamental issue of service had to first be settled.
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