The much anticipated plea and trial preparation hearing of former Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu and his wife, Beatrice, over organ trafficking scheduled for Monday at the Central Criminal Court – a.k.a Old Bailey- will not hold, The Guardian was told on Friday.
“It’s not sitting on Monday, due to non-availability of counsel for Sonia,” a court official told The Guardian. The court official didn’t categorically say whether the Ekweremadus’ sickly graduate daughter, Sonia, is now a defendant in the case, for which her parents were arrested on June 23. The Old Bailey official said they won’t have to wait for long, as the “case will be re-listed for sometime during the week.”
Though Monday’s date was fixed when the couple and their co-defendant appeared before the judge on August 4, Sonia wasn’t listed in the hearing then. The official said “the judge” won’t be hearing the case because “there’s no counsel for Sonia.”
Ekweremadu, unlike his wife – who’s on bail – appeared via video link from prison for the August 4 hearing, and he is said to be sick and “not being treated fairly, a source close to the family, informed The Guardian last month.
The senator and his wife are being charged with Dr Obinna Obeta, with allegations of wanting to make payment for the procurement of organ for their daughter, Sonia, from one David Nwamini. The former deputy senate president in Nigeria has been kept in Her (now His) Majesty’s Prison since the June 23 arrest.
The couple were arrested at Heathrow Airport on June 21 after arriving on a flight from Turkey.
Ike Ekweremadu and Obinna Obeta, from Southwark, south London, were charged with conspiring to arrange or facilitate the travel of a man with a view to him being exploited.
Mrs Ekweremadu and Obeta were charged with arranging the travel of the man with a view to him being exploited.
Prosecutor Tim Probert-Wood said previously that the case involved ‘exploitation and the harvesting of an organ.’
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