Two Bag 24 Years In Jail For Child Theft

A chief magistrate court in Port Harcourt, Rivers State has sentenced two persons, Goodness Thompson, male and Kpereobong Emmanson, female to 24 years in prison for stealing and trafficking a two-year-old neighbour’s son, Etim George in the sum of N350,000.

The duo aged 35 and 28 years respectively are to serve the sentence years consecutively with hard labour, the presiding Magistrate Felicitas Amenze pronounced.

The incident happened at Komkom village in Oyibo Local Government Area of the state, on October 18, 2018.

The child was abducted from the residence where he lived with the parents and the convicts.

The court found them guilty of conspiracy, child trafficking and stealing earlier preferred against them and were sentenced to 7, 10 and 7 years on each of the counts, culminating into 24 years.

In her sentence, Amanze relied on the provision of section 39 of child rights act, 2019.

She said, “the prosecution has established all the ingredients as charged against the first and third defendants.

“The offenses with which 1st and 3rd defendants are charged have been proven beyond any iota of doubt…, the 1st and 3rd defendants are hereby sentenced to 7 years in prison on count one, 10 years on count two and 7 years on count three, with hard labour. The sentence is to run consecutively,” she said.