- By Tom Symonds
- Home Affairs correspondent
Senator Ike Ekweremadu is a distinguished Nigerian politician
A rich Nigerian politician, his spouse and their “middleman” have been jailed for an organ-trafficking plot, after bringing a person to the UK from Lagos.
Senator Ike Ekweremadu, 60, and his spouse Beatrice, 56, needed a brand new kidney for his or her 25-year-old daughter Sonia, the Old Bailey heard.
It is claimed to be the primary such case underneath trendy slavery legal guidelines.
Ike Ekweremadu, who was described by the decide because the “driving force throughout”, was sentenced to 9 years and eight months in jail.
Dr Obeta was sentenced to 10 years after the decide discovered he had focused the potential donor who was younger, poor and weak.
Beatrice Ekweremadu was jailed for 4 years and 6 months on account of her extra restricted involvement.
Their sufferer, a poor road dealer in Lagos, was dropped at the UK to offer a kidney for the Ekweremadus’ daughter.
He fled in concern of his life and walked right into a police station precisely a 12 months in the past to report what had occurred after the Royal Free Hospital referred to as a halt to the personal £80,000 process.
Image supply, Metropolitan Police
“Middleman” Dr Obinna Obeta and the senator’s spouse, Beatrice, have been additionally discovered responsible at a trial that concluded in March
During a televised sentence listening to, Mr Justice Johnson recognised Ike Ekweremadu’s “substantial fall from grace”.
He described the politician as somebody of excessive workplace with a number of properties, home workers, maids, cooks and drivers, in contrast with the sufferer who couldn’t afford a £25 ticket to journey to Abuja.
Obeta, he stated, had lied to docs and falsely claimed the younger potential donor was a cousin of the senator’s daughter who urgently wanted a transplant.
The three had left the potential donor going through a “substantial and long term impact on his daily life”, he stated.
“People-trafficking across international borders for the harvesting of human organs is a form of slavery,” the decide added.
‘My physique isn’t on the market’
In a sufferer private assertion, the 21-year-old Nigerian market dealer, who can’t be named for authorized causes, informed the court docket he used to “pray every day” to be given the chance to come back to the UK to work or research.
He stated to “make it happen” he agreed to medical exams in Lagos and conferences with docs in London, believing they have been required for his UK visa through the Covid pandemic.
The 21-year-old stated he solely realised what was deliberate when he met docs on the Royal Free Hospital in London who started discussing a kidney transplant.
He informed the court docket he wouldn’t had have agreed to it, including: “My body is not for sale.”
The sufferer is now being helped by a charity within the UK, in accordance with his lawyer in Nigeria.
In his assertion the 21-year-old stated he “can’t think about going home to Nigeria”, as “these people are extremely powerful and I worry for my safety”.
He can also be stated to have refused to use for monetary compensation from the Ekweremadu household, telling a detective he “did not need or want anything from the bad people”.
Speaking of the way in which the case is being seen in Nigeria, BBC journalist Nduka Orjinmo, who is predicated there, says Nigerians are used to seeing the wealthy and highly effective having it their very own manner in a rustic the place legal guidelines are flagrantly flouted.
While some have expressed emotions of sympathy for a father making an attempt to assist his sick daughter, he says many are glad {that a} highly effective politician who heartlessly exploited a poor road hawker is going through justice.
Sonia Ekweremadu was cleared of wrongdoing and watched her mother and father being sentenced from the general public gallery
Lynette Woodrow, deputy chief crown prosecutor and nationwide trendy slavery lead on the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), stated it had been “our first conviction for trafficking for the purposes of organ removal in England and Wales”.
She stated it highlighted an essential authorized precept which made it irrelevant whether or not the trafficking sufferer knew he was coming to the UK to offer a kidney.
“With all trafficking offences,” Ms Woodrow stated, “the consent of the person trafficked is no defence. The law is clear; you cannot consent to your own exploitation.”
In the wake of the case the Metropolitan Police and CPS have been working with hospitals and the Human Tissue Authority about actions they need to take when considerations about organ trafficking are raised.
Additional reporting by Nduka Orjinmo in Abuja