Dompa Hyellablani, a Private in the Nigerian Army serving at 351 Artillery in Monguno, Borno State, Northeast Nigeria has been sentenced to die by lethal injection or by hanging for seizing a car from a woman at gunpoint.
Hyellablani who was at 351 Artillery secured a pass to visit Adamawa State, was convicted by a court Yola for snatching a Toyota Camry car with registration number BL 85 LSD Lagos. It belonged to Rita Harrison, a civil servant.
Hyellablani was convicted on a two-count charge of criminal conspiracy and armed robbery. Hon Justice Kanyson Lawanson of Yola High Court pronounced the death sentence on Hyellablani but acquitted Emmanuel Adeka’a, a 19-year-old applicant who was arraigned alongside the soldier on the same charges.
The prosecution established that Hyellablani and Emmanuel had on September 9, 2019, while in front of a restaurant in Jimeta named VIS, robbed Rita Harrison of her car.
The prosecution explained that Hyellablani who is an indigene of Hong in northern Adamawa, and while armed with offensive weapons, dispossessed the woman of her Toyota Camry LE with registration number BL 85 LSD Lagos.
Court papers indicate that the convict was enrolled into the Nigerian Army in 2013, after serving in Plateau State before going on transfer to Borno, with posting to Monguno where he served until 2019.
Hyellablani said in his statement in evidence that while in Monguno in 2019, the military authorities decided to collect all arms from them but that he refused to hand over his own, and that a few days later, he secured a pass and left Borno to Adamawa where he lodged at Jino Hotel in Jimeta on September 8, 2019, where he met the second defendant, Emmanuel Adeka’a, and they became friends.
The court further established that Hyellablani, fully dressed in his military uniform and armed with his rifle, approached Rita Harrison in her car in front of the VIS Restaurant and requested money to buy food, following which the woman gave him N500.
He confessed that he thereafter ordered her to hand over her car key and, to scare her and passersby, he fired four gunshots in the air, and the woman ran off for safety.
He thereafter ordered Emmanuel to drive him away from the scene and to his hotel, at a time put at 11.30 pm.
They were however intercepted by local vigilantes while on their way to the hotel and taken to the Police, which eventually got them arraigned at the Yola High Court.
Delivering the death sentence on Hyellablani, Justice Kanyson, declared that the prosecution had proven its case against the defendant as charged, and sentenced him to death by hanging or by lethal injection.