{"id":66211,"date":"2025-05-21T12:42:05","date_gmt":"2025-05-21T12:42:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=66211"},"modified":"2025-05-21T12:42:05","modified_gmt":"2025-05-21T12:42:05","slug":"forgery-case-stalls-as-defendant-lands-in-hospital","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/05\/21\/forgery-case-stalls-as-defendant-lands-in-hospital\/","title":{"rendered":"Forgery Case Stalls as Defendant Lands in Hospital"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Adenike Lawal<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Drama unfolded at the Lagos State High Court in Tafawa Balewa Square yesterday as the much-anticipated arraignment of two lawyers and a property developer was abruptly postponed following a medical emergency involving one of the accused.<\/p>\n<p>Adebayo Akeju of Adon Partners, Ademola Owolabi of Ademola Adetokunbo and Co., and real estate investor Alex Ochonogor are facing five criminal counts, including forgery and unlawful demolition.<\/p>\n<p>The Lagos State Government alleges the trio forged key land documents to justify the illegal demolition of a property in the elite Lekki Peninsula Residential Scheme I.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors claim the accused conspired as far back as 2015 to falsify an affidavit of loss and a demolition notice, allegedly from the Lagos State Lands Bureau, to target a property belonging to Nigerian diaspora resident Dr. Obidigwe Eze.<\/p>\n<p>The forgery reportedly involved claims that a Certificate of Occupancy tied to one Hamza Al-Mustapha had gone missing.<\/p>\n<p>However, proceedings were halted after Ochonogor&#8217;s lawyer told the court his client had been hospitalized at Lagoon Hospital earlier that day.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecuting counsel, Dr. Babajide Martins, did not oppose the delay, stating, &#8220;The defendant needs to be alive to stand trial.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Justice Serifat Sonaike adjourned the hearing, ordering that all filings be concluded before the next court date and mandating Ochonogor\u2019s presence for arraignment.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, tempers flared outside the courtroom as a Guardian photojournalist, Ayodele Adeniran, was reportedly assaulted by one of the defendants while attempting to take photographs.<\/p>\n<p>The altercation ended only after it was confirmed that no images had been captured.<\/p>\n<p>As the case unfolds, public interest continues to build, fueled by the high-profile names and the explosive allegations at its center.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Adenike Lawal Drama unfolded at the Lagos State High Court in Tafawa Balewa Square yesterday as the much-anticipated arraignment of two lawyers and a property developer was abruptly postponed following a medical emergency involving one of the accused. Adebayo Akeju of Adon Partners, Ademola Owolabi of Ademola Adetokunbo and Co., and real estate investor [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":66212,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1386,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66211","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-judiciary","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66211"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66211\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66213,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66211\/revisions\/66213"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66211"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}