A 20-year-old ex-convict, Wasiu Tajudeen, was on Monday, December 5, 2022, sentenced to five-year imprisonment by a Lagos Federal High Court for dealing in 200 grams of Cannabis Sativa, aka marijuana.
According to media reports, Justice Ambrose Lewis-Allagoa handed down the sentence after Tajudeen pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful dealing in the drug.
The charge was preferred against him by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency.
The prosecutor, Mr Lambert Nor, had told the court that the convict was arrested with the banned drug on July 2, 2022, at Abule-Odu in the Egbeda-Akowonjo LCDA of Alimosho LGA, Lagos State.
The prosecutor told the court that the offence contravened Section 11(c) of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency Act Cap. N30 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, and punishable under the same Act.
The convict pleaded guilty to the charge and asked the court to temper justice with mercy, but the prosecutor told the court that the convict was a serial drug dealer, who had been convicted and sentenced to a year of imprisonment by Justice Abdullahi Liman.
To prove his claim, the prosecutor tendered a conviction warrant dated January 29, 2020, issued by Justice Liman against the convict.
Upon admitting the conviction warrant, Justice Lewis-Allagoa sentenced the convict to five-year imprisonment without an option of fine.
