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FAILURE TO PROVIDE AN INTERPRETER FOR AN ACCUSED IS NOT FATAL

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Dictum

In any case, I hold that failure to provide an interpreter where an accused person is represented by counsel, and there is/was no objection raised at the trial court, this will not result in vitiating the trial or result in disturbing or interfering with the judgment of a trial court. It will or may be a different thing where there is no counsel representing the accused person and where such failure will or has led to a miscarriage of justice or that the accused person has been prejudiced thereby as a result.

— Ogbuagu, JSC. Udosen v State (2007) – SC.199/2005

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WHERE ACCUSED PLEADS GUILTY TO AN OFFENCE

The law is settled that if an accused person pleads guilty to an offence with which he is charged, the Court shall record his plea as nearly as possible in the words used by him and if satisfied that he intended to admit the truth of all the essentials of the offence of which he had pleaded guilty, the Court shall convict him of that offence and pass sentence against him unless there appear sufficient cause to the contrary. See Daniel v. F.R.N (2015) 13 NWLR (pt. 1475) 119; Kolo v. COP (2017) 9 NWLR (pt. 1569) 118.

– J.I. Okoro JSC. Balogun v. FRN (2021)

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SUFFICIENTLY RECOGNISED THE ACCUSED PERSON

I quite agree with Aderemi, JSC, when he stated in NDIDI v. THE STATE (supra) that a trial Judge must not only warn himself but must meticulously examine the evidence proffered to see whether there are any weaknesses capable of endangering or rendering worthless any contention that the accused person was sufficiently recognised by the witness.

— E. Eko, JSC. Kekong v State (2017) – SC.884/2014

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ESSENCE OF AN ACCUSED BEING PRESENT AT HIS CRIMINAL TRIAL

The trial Court having conducted the proceedings of 20/11/2015 in the absence of the Respondent jumped the guns and breached his constitutional right. The essence of the presence of an accused throughout his trial is to afford him an adequate opportunity to play his statutory role and liberty to respond at every stage of the proceedings personally or through a legal practitioner of his own choice for the purpose of ensuring fair hearing.

— U.M. Abba Aji, JSC. State v. Andrew Yanga (SC.712/2018, 15 Jan 2021)

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ACCUSED CAN BE CONVICTED ON HIS CONFESSION

The law is trite that an accused person can be convicted solely on his confession if the confession is positive and direct in the admission of the offence charged. In other words, voluntary confession of guilt whether judicial or extra judicial, if it is direct and positive is sufficient proof of the guilt and is enough to sustain a conviction, so long as the Court is satisfied with the truth of such a confession.

– Abdu Aboki, JSC. Chukwu v. State (2021)

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PRIOR CONDUCT OF THE ACCUSED IS ADMISSIBLE TO EXPLAIN ACCUSED’S CONDUCT

Surely, the general rule in criminal as well as in civil cases that the evidence must be confined to the point in issue cannot be applied where the facts which constitute distinct offences are at the same time part of the transaction which is the subject of the charge. Evidence is necessarily admissible as to acts which are so closely and inextricably mixed up with the history of the criminal act itself as to form part of one chain of relevant circumstances, and so could not be excluded in the presentment of the case without the evidence being thereby rendered unintelligible. Thus, in cases of murder, evidence is admissible to show prior assaults by the accused upon the murdered person or menaces uttered to him by the accused, or to show conversely the irritable behaviour by the deceased to the accused. Again, the relations of the murdered man to his assailant, so far as they may reasonably be treated as explanatory of the conduct of the person charged with the crime, can be admitted to prove as integral parts of the history of the alleged crime for which the accused is on his trial. (See R. v. Bond (1906) 2 KB 389 as per Kennedy, J., at pp. 400 and 401).

— Idigbe, JSC. Ishola v State (1978) – SC.8/1977

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BEFORE AN ACCUSED CAN BE CONVICTED FOR A LESSER OFFENCE

This power cannot be exercised at large. It is subject to certain limitations. Before an accused person can be convicted of a lesser offence, the ingredients of the lesser offence must be subsumed or embedded in the original offence charged and the circumstances in which the lesser offence was committed must be similar to those contained in the offence charged. See: The Nigerian Airforce vs Kamaldeen (2007) 2 SC 113: (2007) 7 NWLR (Pt. 1032) 164: Saliu Vs The State (2018) 10 NWLR (Pt. 1627) 346; Agugua vs The State (2017) LPELR 4202 (SC).

— K.M.O. Kekere-Ekun, JSC. Onukwube v. State (2020) – SC.1214C/2018

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