[b]An accused that jumped bail in 2006 and was believed to be dead after a team of lawyers as well as policemen visited his hometown to see his grave, yesterday appeared before an Abuja magistrate court to continue his trial.

The man, Bala Gyang was first arraigned on February 19 2006, on a case of alleged car theft and the court granted him bail.

Our reporter learnt from a lawyer that the accused has been using the identity and documents of a dead person to secure employments.

The lawyer further stated that a surety, Emmanuel Ogbeche signed the bail bond for the accused person’s release from detention on April 6, 2007and he vanished into thin air and never showed up in subsequent hearings of the case, which made the court to make an order on November 20, 2007 requesting the surety to fulfil the bail bond by remitting N150,000.

The trial magistrate, Abdul Dogo, also issued a bench warrant for his arrest, which prompted the surety to mobilize officers of the Nigeria Police Force, who travelled to the accused person’s place at Vom, in Plateau State.

The surety’s lawyer, Esther Uzoma, told the court that when they went to Vom, they were shown a grave where Bala Gyang was buried as well as his death certificate.

“The family told us that Gyang died during the Jos crises, which arouse our suspicion that the accused was still alive because the crisis took place before he was first arraigned for the alleged theft,” the lawyer said.

According to her, the surety informed her that he will rather expend money searching for the accused than go for an appeal and he used his life savings to the tune of N750,000 before the accused was sighted and arrested in a slum at Durumi, where he lives with his wife and children.

When the case was called for hearing yesterday, Prosecutor Jeremiah Elijah, who stood in for somebody said he was confused as to the stage of the case and the surety’s lawyer, Barrister Esther Uzoma then briefed the court on the situation of the case.

She made an application for the court to vacate its order on November 20, 2007 compelling the surety to remit N150,000 as bail bond as well as told the magistrate to also discharge the Emmanuel Ogbeche from standing as surety to the accused.

“We want your Lordship to grant our prayers considering the hardship faced by the surety,” Barrister Uzoma stated.

Magistrate Dogo shifted ruling on the surety’s application to August 13 and ordered the remand of the accused in prison custody until that date.

Our reporter learnt that the accused, who is a driver, was dismissed from the Federal Road Safety Commission.[/b]

Daily Trust

Nigeria, we hail thee!

well stuff like this happens around the world,
but the guys in those other places have the common sense to relocate to another village/town/city or country.

This is very very strange

Then he's certainly not a "dead" man.