A Federal High Court, Abuja has fined the Department of State Services (DSS) N2 million over the unlawful seizure of the phones of publisher Omoyele Sowore in 2019 at the point of his arrest.
Ruling on Wednesday in a fundamental rights enforcement suit, Justice Anwuli Chikere also ordered the DSS to release forthwith the iPhones and the sum of N10,000 which were alleged to have been forcefully taken away from him without court warrant.
Operatives of the DSS committed the act on August 3, 2019, while arresting Mr Sowore at a hotel in Lagos on allegations of treasonable felony and terrorism. The publisher had called for a protest nationwide called #RevolutionNow and staged it in some locations.
The judge ordered the DSS to also tender an apology in two national dailies within two months.
Chikere described the forceful seizure of the personal property of the publisher of SaharaReporters as “illegal, unconstitutional, null and void and gross violation of his fundamental rights as enshrined in the 1999 Constitution.
She said the DSS ought to have obtained court order before the confiscation of his belongings and that the seizure can not be regarded as “temporary” since 2019.
The judge also held that the claim by the DSS that his phones were still under investigation since 2019 over his alleged link with terrorists was untenable, illegal and unconstitutional.
