A special revenue task force set up by the Kogi State judiciary has uncovered a N4.8m fraud allegedly committed by some staff in the state high court.
The Chairman of the task force, Mr Sunday Paul, who disclosed this on Thursday, said he routinely embarked on checking the account inflows of the court in conjunction with the banks into which payments and fines due to the court were meant to be paid.
He said in the course of doing that he stumbled on a syndicated mechanism where payments to the court by legal chambers, their practitioners and other individuals were manipulated with customised bank tellers and bank stamps to defraud the court.
He explained that, “On the 28th October, 2022, the sum of N2,400,000 was paid as judgement debt revenue and bank teller was presented as evidence of payment. I went to the bank on the 7th November, 2022, to collect bank statements for my monthly reconciliation for the month of October, 2022. Amazingly, the said N2.4m was not in the bank statement.”
“Out of curiosity, we consulted the court’s relevant department before revisiting the bank where they further confirmed that there were other similar unremitted transactions.
“In my curiosity to know what happened to the said money, I immediately informed the process unit where the money is supposed to come from. I photocopied the teller and I took it to the bank for verification. My verification revealed that the money was not paid into the revenue account.
“In addition, the bank teller presented as evidence of payment to the process unit, the stamp on the teller and the signature on it were all fake.
“The fake signature also tallies with those of previous years as an indication of how long the fraud has been perpetrated.”
Responding to the discoveries, the acting Chief Judge (CJ) of the state, Justice Josiah Majebi, said the matter was already before the police for thorough investigation.
He explained that, “In the report dated 9th November, 2022, and captioned: “Fraudulent Practice”, we gathered that in the monthly reconciliation of accounts, the sum of N2.4m said to have been paid into the court’s account was not paid despite evidence of payment showing same.
“We have inaugurated this Revenue Task Force (RTF) to urgently verify all payments allegedly made to the High Court of Justice in the last two years.”
He demanded credibility and honesty from management and staff of the court, stressing that the institution must be preserved for both present and future generations.
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