By Ishaya Ibrahim
The huge wealth of former Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, may have contributed to his sentencing by a UK court.
Ekweremadu was handed a prison term of nine years and six months over a plot to harvest the kidney of a 21-year-old man, David Ukpo.
His wife, Beatrice, was given 4 years and six months.
The court sentenced the medical doctor who acted as a ‘middleman’ in the plot, Dr Obinna Obeta, to 10 years. His medical licence was also suspended.
While delivering the judgment, Justice Jeremy Johnson said Ekweremadu was the driving force in the scheme to harvest the kidney of Ukpo, who was nicknamed C, during the trial.
The judge took time to review Ekweremadu’s economic standing before handing him the sentence.
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He said: “You, Ike Ekweremadu are a senator in Nigeria’s National Assembly. You have held high political office. You have many staff including domestic staff, maids, chefs, and drivers.
“You have multiple properties around the globe. There is evidence that these properties are more than 40.
“Over £400,000 went into your bank account over a period of six months.”
In March 2023, a jury found that the trio criminally conspired to bring a 21-year-old Lagos street trader to London to exploit him for his kidney.
The young man was said to have been falsely presented as Sonia’s cousin in a failed bid to persuade doctors to carry out an £80,000 private procedure at the Royal Free Hospital in London.
The young man was said to have been offered an illegal reward of £7,000 (N3.5m) to become a donor for Sonia after kidney disease forced her to drop out of a master’s degree in film at Newcastle University.