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The eight bank staff standing trial in an ‘N8 billion fraud’ case in a Federal High Court, Ibadan were on Monday, sent back to prison custody, by Justice Adeyinka Faaj.
It was the second time their hope for bail was being shattered following the failure of counsels to complete service of processes to one another before arguments for their bail could be taken.
Both prosecution and defence counsels were yet to fully receive all counter and further affidavits in the two cases before the stage would be set for arguments for their bail applications.
The next opportunity they have is Thursday when counsels will return to court to argue applications for bail after all processes are expected to have been served all counsels in the two cases heard today (Monday).
The eight accused persons are among the 22 bankers being arraigned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on behalf of the Federal Government. They include six officials of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and commercial banks.
The eight were arraigned on a 28-count charge bordering on forgery, misrepresentation and self-enrichment as part of the larger N8 billion mutilated currency fraud at the CBN. The others are concealing of property, fraudulently acquiring assets in excess of their legitimate and provable income and causing economic adversity to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The CBN employees are Kolawole Babalola, Olaniran Adeola and Togun Kayode Phillips. Their alleged accomplices are Isiaq Akano, Ayodele Festus Adeyemi, Oyebamiji Hakeem, Ayodeji Alese and Ajiwe Adegoke
The EFCC, in the charge, claimed that the CBN staff conspired with the First Bank employees to recycle N10 billion mutilated currency notes meant to be destroyed.
The accused persons, according to the prosecution counsel, Mr Rotimi Jacobs, instead of carrying out the statutory instruction to destroy the defaced currency notes as their duty demands, substituted the currency with newspapers neatly cut to naira sizes and proceeded to recycle the mutilated and defaced currency.
See more: Suspects in CBN 8bn scam own houses in S/Africa, fuel stations, shopping malls