An Ondo State High Court has ordered the state government to pay the sum of N30million as compensation to a commercial motorcyclist identified as Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi who lost his leg to a gunshot injury inflicted on by the officers of the state’s security network agency code-named Amotekun.
Justice Adejumo held that the treatment meted on the applicant amounted to a violation of his right to dignity and awarded the sum as damages.
Oluwasegun was working when operatives of Amotekun Corps made his life miserable on August 9, 2021.
His lawyer, Tope Temokun, filed the suit on 28 October, over one year after the incident happened.
Temokun filed the suit after receiving a 26 October, 2022 reply of the state government to his complaint letter, alleging that his client was arrested while the Amotekun officers were on a trail of kidnap and armed robbery suspects.
Oluwasegun described the state government’s claim as “a wicked lie” in his affidavit filed in support of his suit.
Sued along with Ondo State government as co-defendants are the state’s Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice and the State Security Network Agency (Amotekun).
His lawyer confirmed the judgement in a statement on Wednesday.
The statement read, “Today, the 29th of March 2023, the Ondo State High Court, presided over by Justice Adejumo, gave judgment in the case filed by Mr. Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi, a 36 year-old Okada rider who was shot in the leg by the Ondo State Security Network Agency, code-named Amotekun, in Akure, on the 9th of August 2021 and awarded the sum of THIRTY MILLION NAIRA as damages against the Ondo State Government, sued as the first respondent in the case and the Amotekun Corps.
“By motion on notice filed on the 28th of October 2022, Mr Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi sued the ONDO STATE GOVERNMENT, the ATTORNEY-GENERAL AND COMMISSIONER FOR JUSTICE ONDO STATE, the ONDO STATE SECURITY NETWORK AGENCY (codenamed “Amotekun Corps”) and the COMMANDANT ONDO STATE SECURITY NETWORK AGENCY, asking for the sum of fifty million naira as general damages and fifty million naira as exemplary damages.
“The Ondo State High Court, presided over by Justice Adejumo, gave judgment in the case filed by Mr. Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi, gave judgment this morning and asked the Ondo State Government to pay Mr Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi, who is now an amputee, the sum of THIRTY MILLION NAIRA as damages. In awarding this sum, the court dondemned in the strongest terms the illegal shooting of the applicant in the leg that led to the amputation of his leg.
“The case of Mr. Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi, was that on the 9th day of August, 2021 between 8:00am-9:00am when in the course of his daily hustle as an okada rider, he took a passenger to Araromi, Akure and when the passenger alighted from his Okada and gave him a N500 note, he had to look for his ”change”.
“It was around this time that an Amotekun Corps pickup van drove in, swerved towards where he parked my motorcycle by the roadside and some uniformed Amotekun officers disembarked from the vehicle and started fired gunshots to the air which caused fears amongst those around and caused people to start running; Before he could make any sense of the whole scene, an Officer of Amotekun fired a shot on his leg.
“He suffered bleeding for about 9 hours and was eventually taken by the Amotekun Corps to the Federal Medical Centre Owo, where he was attended to briefly but could not really be given serious medical attention because of the ongoing strike action of the doctors at the time.
“He said he was in this painful condition, in tears every day, till Saturday, the 14th day of August, 2021 when his mother suddenly showed up and said that she had been looking for him since Monday the 9th of August, 2021. He was taken away from the FMC Owo and operated at a private hospital where his decomposing leg was cut off.”