An Ado-Ekiti Chief Magistrates’ Court, on Monday, sentenced a 39-year-old woman, Mercy Momoh, to three years imprisonment for stealing one-month-old baby.
The Chief Magistrate, Mr. Adesoji Adegboye, found the convict, whose house address was not given, guilty of the charge of stealing.
The convict had pleaded guilty to the charge and begged for leniency by the court.
The Magistrate, who summarily tried and sentenced the convict to three years imprisonment, however, gave her an option of N100,000 fine.
Earlier, the police prosecutor, Sgt. Samson Osobu, had told the court that the convict committed the offence on Sept. 20 at the state government secretariat in Ado-Ekiti.
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Osobu told the court that convict had stolen a month-old baby belonging to Funmilayo Dada.
According to him, the offence contravenes Section 371 of the Criminal Code, Laws of Ekiti State, 2012.
He told the court that the convict had seen the woman with her baby and tricked her with the story that the Ekiti State Empowerment Programme at the state secretariat was disbursing money to the less-privileged.
The prosecutor said that the convict had further tricked the woman to leave her baby and cell phone with her, while she sent her to help purchase call card.
Osobu said that when the woman came back, both the convict and her baby were nowhere to be found.
He added that the mother of the baby reported the matter at the police station and that through information, the convict was apprehended by the police and the baby given back to the mother.
NAN
