Torture: Widow demands N500m from police for husband’s death

Altine, the widow of 33-year-old Dauda Danladi who was allegedly tortured to death by the police, has slammed a suit against the Nigeria Police Force before the Federal High Court, Bauchi, demanding N500m as damages.

Our correspondent had reported that Dauda was arrested by a team of operatives in front of his shop at Yelwa Tsakani, a suburb of the Bauchi metropolis, around 9pm on Thursday, July 8, 2021.

He was taken to the Yelwa Police Division, where he was allegedly tortured to death.

But the Police Public Relations Officer, SP Ahmed Wakil, in a statement, claimed that a patrol team went to the area to arrest some suspects and saw Dauda lying in front of his shop and gasping for breath.

Wakil claimed that the victim, who was suspected to be having an asthmatic attack, was rushed to a hospital, where he was confirmed dead.

However, the deceased’s widow, in suit number FHC/BAU/CS/27/2028 and sworn to by her team of lawyers, sought the enforcement of her husband’s fundamental right to life as guaranteed by Section 33 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules 2009, Cap. 10, Laws of Nigeria 1990.

Respondents in the case included the Inspector General of Police, Usman Baba; the Commissioner of Police, Bauchi State, Sylvester Alabi; and the Divisional Police Officer, Yelwa, Philip Akolo.

In her motion on notice, she stated that the suspects the police arrested and later freed, including one Markus Hezekiah, who owned a snooker board close to her late husband’s shop, told her that the officers used sticks to flog her husband.

“My late husband tried to resist the arrest and was telling them that he was conducting a legitimate business and that he did not do anything wrong. But they refused to allow him to even close his shop; they pushed him into their Hilux van.

“When they were about to push him into the Hilux van, he slumped and they forcefully dragged him into the van,” she said.

Altine added that after all those arrested were forced into the van, “they realised that my late husband was still lying on the floor of the vehicle and was not moving. The people there alerted the officers of the respondents that my late husband was unconscious and was not moving. The officers, who were at the back of the van with them, replied that he was pretending for the purpose of refusing arrest.”

According to her, because the officers were many, there was no space in the Hilux van as “people kept stepping on my late husband as he laid there not moving.”

She added, “When they finally arrived in the Yelwa division, my late husband was still unconscious. They brought him down and laid him on the veranda of the Yelwa division. After that, the officers brought water and poured on him, but he did not respond.

 “At that point, they laid him down behind the counter and when he was still not responding, they quickly moved him out and that was the last time he (Hezekiah), and others saw him.

“The snooker board owner also informed me that it took more than one hour from the time of the arrest before they arrived at the Yelwa division and all this while, my late husband was lying on the floor of the Hilux unconscious and nobody attended to him.”

The widow stated that the death certificate the family obtained from the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University Teaching Hospital, Bauchi, showed that her husband was taken to a hospital by 11pm, which corroborated the account of the snooker board’s owner “that the police spent more than one hour from the point of arrest to the police station at Yelwa and possibly the rest of the time was used to convey the deceased to the said hospital.”

(The PUNCH)