Labourer jailed five months for stealing armoured cables

A Lugbe Grade 1 Area Court, Abuja, on Tuesday, sentenced a 20-year-old labourer, Ishaya Hassan, to five months in a correction centre for stealing armoured cables.

The judge, Mallam Aliyu Kagarko, sentenced Hassan after he pleaded guilty to the offence of stealing and prayed the court for mercy.

Kagarko, however, gave Hassan the option of payment of N30,000 fine, warning him against committing crime in the future.

He said the punishment would have been stiffer if the convict had not saved the court the rigours of a protracted prosecution.

Earlier, the prosecution counsel, Stanley Nwaforaku, said that one Sgt. Joshua Simon of Defence Intelligence Agency, Asokoro, Abuja, arrested the convict and the case was transferred to the Asokoro police station on Dec. 1.

According to him, the convict, who was a labourer at DIA construction site, on Nov. 11, 2023, dishonestly made away with 28 meters of 12mm armoured cable from the store.

He added that the convict was later caught and handed over to the police for investigation.

The prosecutor said that during police interrogation and investigation, the convict confessed to the crime and the cables were recovered from him.

Nwaforaku said that the offence committed contravened Section 287 of the Penal Code.