Naira Marley’s Trial for Cybercrime Continues June 1

Defence, on Thursday the 7th day of April, 2022, concluded cross-examination of the second prosecution witness in the trial of a musician, Azeez Fashola (aka Naira Marley) facing cybercrime charges.

The second prosecution witness, Mr. Augustine Anosike, is a forensic analyst, who began evidence in 2021.

Newsmen report that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is prosecuting the defendant.

Fashola, who sang the popular song: “Am I a yahoo boy”, was arraigned on May 20, 2019, before Justice Nicholas Oweibo, but he pleaded not guilty.

The court granted him bail in the sum of two million naira, with two sureties in like sum.

On Thursday, the defence concluded a cross-examination of the second prosecution witness, who ended evidence on Oct. 27, 2021.

During the cross-examination, defence counsel, Mr Olalekan Ojo (SAN), asked the witness what he understood by “to authorize a text or WhatsApp message”.

In response, the witness told the court that in his opinion, authorship referred to the producer or maker of the text.

On whether he confirms if the messages extracted from Fashola’s phone were products of human activities, he said, “I cannot tell because I am not in possession of the gadgets that transferred the messages”.

According to him, since the gadgets used for sending and receiving messages belonged to a human, that human is supposed to know how the messages emerged.

Defence counsel also asked the witness if he indicated in his report that the name Azeez Fashola was the sender of any of the messages.

The witness attempted to state that the defendant had other names saved in his phone, but defence counsel asked him to answer the question directly.

In response, the witness replied, “I cannot remember”.

When defence counsel asked that Exhibit F be shown to the witness as it contained details of his analysis which he had told the court was material to the case, the witness replied “My lord, I am not sure.”

Defence counsel then said, “My lord, we are not comfortable with the reply: “I am not sure”.

It alleged that the defendant used a bank credit card issued to another person, in a bid to obtain fraudulent financial gains.

The EFCC also said that the defendant possessed counterfeit credit cards belonging to different people, with intent to defraud which amounted to theft.

The alleged offences contravene the provisions of Sections 1 23 (1) (b), 27 (1) and 33(9) of the Cyber Crime (Prohibition) Prevention Act, 2015.