SAN FRANCISCO, April 13, (THEWILL) – Former Delta State governor, James Onanefe Ibori, did not receive a dime from the alleged £37m V-Mobile loot, his defence counsel told a London court weekend.
The court is likely to sit on the matter on Wednesday subject to confirmation.
But maintaining that the former governor, who is currently serving a prison term in the United Kingdom, did not receive a dime from V-Mobile account as alleged by the prosecuting team in the confiscation of assets’ case, his counsel,Ivan Krolick submitted that out of the £37 million connected to V-Mobile which the prosecution team said Ibori benefitted from, there is no evidence that the money was paid into his account.
During the submission on V-Mobile, only the name of Ibori’s former solicitor and his former Commissioner of Finance, respectively was mentioned in the court as Krolick insisted that Ibori only approved documents relating to V-Mobile.
The lawyer also told the court that even when a financial forensic expert was invited to the court and was cross-examined by both the defence and the prosecuting teams, there was no trace of Delta State money connected to Ibori’s benefit. Krolick said their case was so clear because the forensic expert dealt with the issue of Delta State money in detail.
The lawyer constantly reminded the court that the case now is a ‘pure law’ of money laundering, unlike trial issues,saying confiscation trial is a quantitative case and not because he pleaded guilty is enough for confiscation.
“We said no, this is not so. This is not being ambushed,” Krolick said.
Another issue that dominated Krolick’s submission was the introduction of ‘assumption’ which the prosecuting team had prayed the court late last year to apply on some of Ibori’s loots including the £89 million as against limiting it to £330, 000 and £25,000 on Abbey Road management fees – one of Ibori’s property.
The issue of assumption which QC Shasha Wass introduced in the case is a criminal justice act of 1988 (as amended), seeking section 72AA of proceeds of crime act 1995 to establish Ibori benefits and possible forfeiture.
The defence lawyer persistently argued that to make assumptions on the whole £89 million instead of the two items was what they are also against. But the prosecution team in their earlier submission said Ibori had not discharged the honour of proof regarding his income, “but again we are arguing that they had enough time to bring in their witnesses, but could not,” he said.
He told the judge that there was nothing pointing to the fact that they had deviated from their stand or amount to any surprise in this case relating to their skeletal argument.
He also reminded the Judge that the prosecution team could not say that they were unaware of their stand in this case; that all that was needed was evidence linking Ibori with what they are asking for.
He said portraying Ibori as the master and Gohil as servant was not enough reason to link whatever Gohil had committed as part of Ibori’s deed.
“Your honour, sometime last year, you said the introduction of assumption by the prosecuting team is like not only removing the goal post, but removing the entire pitch,” Krolick told Judge Pitt.
He further said that in all their submissions, they had never asked for evidence of guilt, but evidence of obtaining benefits, saying they are only concerned with what Ibori obtained.
“But for the prosecuting team to ask for evidence is also what we are not happy with,” he said.
