A Kwara State High Court sitting in Ilorin on Thursday sentenced the Serikin Fulani, also known as Alhaji Usman Adamu, his brother, and one Gidado Idris to life imprisonment for conspiracy to kidnap.

The case which was investigated by the DSS, was further prosecuted by the Kwara State Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Ayoola Akande.

The culprits were accused of kidnapping one Abubakar Ahmad last year and collected a ransom of N1 million before releasing him 20 days later.

While giving her judgment, Justice Adenike Akinpelu maintained that the trio agreed to commit the offence and didn’t matter if they were physically present at the kidnap scene or not.

She added that the convicts “supposedly arrested their victim claiming that he was a kidnap suspect to extort money from him.

“I am not persuaded by the submissions of counsel to defendants to dismiss the two- count charge against them based on the fact that they were not at the scene of the incident.

” It is saddening and disturbing that community leaders charged with the welfare of their subjects could because of the love of money breach the security of the same subjects. They are hereby found guilty as charged and are so convicted”, the Judge said.

After listening to the convicts’ allocutus plea of having over 20 children, more than eight wives and being the breadwinner of the family, the judge said that “by Section 15 of the Kwara state Anti-Kidnapping Law, the court cannot exercise any discretion of leniency, so you are hereby sentence to life imprisonment. The sentence is to run concurrently”, she ordered.

She further ordered that the victim of the abduction should be paid a sum of N600,000.