High-Profile Fraud: EFCC Beams Searchlight On Four FCT Judges

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has beamed its searchlight on four high court judges in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) for allegedly frustrating the probe of high-profile corruption cases.
The judges are said to have developed a penchant for going soft with suspects who approach their courts to stop their trial for corruption by EFCC, The Nation reports.
The courts of the affected judges, it was learnt, have thus become an attraction for suspects who want to frustrate their trials.
The report stated that the EFCC is already contemplating the idea of a tribunal to try suspects with overwhelming evidence of corruption cases against them.
The anti-graft agency’s suspicion was reportedly aroused by spurious injunctions persistently coming from the judges.
A well-placed source in the EFCC told the newspaper: “In the past few weeks, we have discovered that almost every day, there was one judgment or the other against us. We have been subjected to ‘arrangee’ injunctions”.
“Some judges in the FCT have been bought over by some high-profile suspects on trial for corruption. From our findings, four judges are involved.
“We are trying to reach out to the Chief Judge of FCT, Justice Ishaq Bello on our observations and the ethics of the Bench. What these big suspects do is that they always try to compromise these four judges. Thereafter, they bring applications to their courts under the enforcement of fundamental human rights to get reprieve and frustrate investigation by EFCC.
“Even before we interrogate these suspects, the judges would have issued orders for their release”.
The source further said that although there are designated judges handling corruption-related matters “maybe we will come up with a tribunal to fast-track the trial of all these suspects who have looted our treasury”.
The source, however, said that “the judges at the Federal High Court have improved on their treatment of corruption cases”.
Recall that the EFCC recently lodged a formal complaint of alleged misconduct against Justice M. N. Yunusa (Federal High Court) with the National Judicial Council (NJC).
He was alleged to have been bribed with N225,000 by a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Mr. Rickey Tarfa, who is currently being prosecuted by the EFCC.
It was not immediately clear if these four judges might also be referred to the NJC, which is empowered to sanction errant judges.