N8,000 debt suicide: How Oyo police triggered ‘poor’ student’s death

New details emerging from the suicide of a polytechnic student, Al-Amin Mohammed, suggest that the mishandling of the matter by the Oyo State Police Command triggered his death.

Saturday PUNCH gathered that the police allegedly failed to interrogate or arrest the woman accused of taking Al-Amin’s mobile phone, which started the dispute.

Our correspondent had reported that the 30-year-old was detained by the Sanyo Police Division over a debt of N8,000.

When his family failed to pay the N100,000 allegedly demanded by the police for his bail, he was taken to court.

He was subsequently remanded at the Agodi Custodial Centre pending the perfection of the bail conditions set by the court.

A few days after his bail, Al-Amin, who combined aluminium work with his studies at a polytechnic in Kwara State, ingested poison and died.

After our correspondent’s report, the police spokesperson, Ayanlade Olayinka, issued a statement, insisting that Al-Amin was prosecuted for assault and malicious damage to an Airtel SIM registration machine valued at N177,000.

He noted that the charges had nothing to do with the N8,000 debt.

But a review of the charge sheet by our reporter showed that the police’s statement was not totally correct.

The sheet revealed that Al-Amin was charged with conduct likely to cause a breach of public peace and damage to an Android Itel phone valued at N177,000.

More significantly, the second count contained the N8,000 debt.

A retired Deputy Superintendent of Police, Isiaka Ayole, told Saturday PUNCH he took bail of the deceased from the Agodi Custodial Centre and discovered he might have been tutored on his rights in prison, which he said the police violated.

He said the seizure of Al-Amin’s phone set the chain of events in motion.

“When I went to bail him from Agodi, the boy told me categorically that he suffered prison remand because he was poor. I tried to disabuse his mind that he should not see it like that.

“He said, Brother, do you know they made me suffer because I don’t know anyone?’ He sounded depressed. He said Iya Ajike, the woman who took his phone while he was asleep, was the real offender. When he said that, I knew he must have been tutored in prison.”

Iya Ajike is the apprentice of Kazeem Mukaila, a Point-of-Sale business owner.

Al-Amin had approached her to take N23,000 cash.

He made a transfer of N15,000 and claimed he had gone beyond his daily transaction limit. He promised to pay the balance of N8,000 later.

When he did not pay, Iya Ajike went to his place and saw him sleeping.

She then seized his phone, as confirmed to Saturday PUNCH by Mukaila and the deceased’s family.

When Al-Amin returned to recover the phone, there was a scuffle during which an Airtel-branded phone used for business was alleged to have been damaged.

Al-Amin insisted he was not responsible for the damage, but was detained by a vigilante, handed over to the police, taken to court and remanded in prison.

“Taking the property of someone who was sleeping is unlawful seizure. It is unalwful (unlawful) and punishable by law. The boy kept repeating that to me as we were leaving the prison. He kept saying the police and the complainant punished him unjustly,” Ayole added.

According to the retired officer, the dispute could have been handled differently by the police.

“Since the complainant had outrightly claimed he was not interested in a case but his money, why didn’t the police serve as a mediator, especially when they saw the debtor’s parents, who agreed to sign an undertaking to ensure the money was paid?

“I spent 15 years at the State CID, Yaba. I spent five years at Alagbon. I was also the Officer in Charge, CP Special Squad in charge of crime for three years in Ondo State, so as a retired chief investigator, I know what I am talking about.

“If the police are truly not after bail money as they claimed, why didn’t they allow the parents to serve as guarantors and work out ways the money would be paid? That’s how it should be done.”

‘Mother sold phone to pay for transport’

Al-Amin’s father, Habeeb Mohammed, also maintained that the family’s financial circumstances were tough.

Speaking with Saturday PUNCH on Friday during the Fidau prayer for Al-Amin, Habeeb said the Divisional Crime Officer at the Sanyo Police Division demanded N100,000 for bail.

He said the case was subsequently charged.

A lawyer was said to have stood for him pro bono after listening to the family’s ordeal.

“His mother sold her phone the day he was remanded to be able to raise money for transport to visit him in prison and buy food to take to him in prison,” he added.

The bereaved father said he subsequently resorted to seeking financial assistance from relatives and well-wishers to get money to meet the bail conditions.

“I had to resort to seeking alms from relatives and well-wishers. I also sold some items to be able to raise money to meet the bail terms set by the court, so that the boy would leave the prison,” he said.

Habeeb said the family was still struggling to understand how an N8,000 dispute ended with the death of their son.

“They just cut short the life of that promising boy. He was the one taking care of us. He was our shining light,” he said.

The father had earlier alleged that the DCO told the family that their son would be sent to prison if they could not raise the required money.

‘Police can’t detain debtor’

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A senior associate in the law firm of Yusuf Ali & Co, Taofiq Olateju, said seizure of another person’s property without lawful authority was not permissible merely because the person owed money.

“Unlawful seizure of a property is a criminal offence,” he said.

“By Section 44 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, every person is allowed under that constitutional provision to own property.

“It is illegal for anyone to unlawfully seize another person’s property without any valid court order. The only exception to seizure of property is when there is a valid court order to that effect.

“You cannot exercise unilateral power to seize another person’s property basically because that person is owing you money or is owing you other items.”

Olateju said a creditor who wanted to recover a debt was expected to use lawful means rather than take the law into their own hands.

A constitutional lawyer, Musbau Saheed, told Saturday PUNCH that it is illegal for anyone to seize the property of a person owing him without first obtaining a court order, and that the police had no power to detain a debtor.

Saheed said the practice, commonly referred to as self-help, is prohibited under Nigerian law and could amount to a criminal offence.

He said, “What many people do not understand is that once you seize someone’s property because he owes you, without a court order or without involving the police lawfully, you have committed an offence. Nigerian law does not allow self-help. Section 44 of the 1999 Constitution is clear that no property of a citizen can be compulsorily taken without due process of law.

“The Supreme Court has settled this in Military Governor of Lagos State vs Ojukwu. Even the government cannot resort to self-help, let alone a private individual. If someone owes you, you go to court, get judgment, and then apply for a writ of attachment. It is the sheriff or bailiff of the court that will attach the property, not you.”

The lawyer explained that such illegal seizure could be treated as stealing and criminal conversion under the Criminal Code and Penal Code.

“If you take somebody’s car, television, goods or lock his shop because of debt, the law sees it as stealing and conversion. Under Section 383 and 390 of the Criminal Code applicable in the South and Sections 286 and 288 of the Penal Code applicable in the North, you can be prosecuted. It is also trespass,” he added.

On the action of police officers who allegedly left a creditor who illegally seized a debtor’s property and instead detained the debtor, Saheed described it as a gross abuse of police powers and a violation of the debtor’s fundamental human rights.

He said a debt is a purely civil matter and the police have no power to arrest or detain a debtor at the instance of a creditor.

“That is completely illegal and unprofessional. The police have no business detaining a debtor. Section 32(2) of the Police Act, 2020 is very clear that a person shall not be arrested merely on account of a civil wrong or breach of contract. Debt is civil, not criminal.

“What the police did here is even worse, they ignored the actual crime of criminal conversion and stealing committed by the creditor who seized property without a court order, and instead detained the victim whose property was seized. That is double wrong. First, they condoned illegality; second, they violated Section 35 of the Constitution, which guarantees personal liberty,” Saheed stated.

He advised creditors to follow legal channels to recover debts and said victims could seek redress in court.

“Anybody whose property has been seized in this manner should report to the police for stealing and criminal conversion or go to court to file for detinue. The court will order the release of the property and may award damages.

“The victim of unlawful detention over debt can also file a fundamental rights enforcement suit against the police and the creditor. Under the Fundamental Rights Enforcement Procedure Rules, 2009, the court can award damages running into millions for unlawful arrest.

“The officers involved can also be reported to the Police Complaint Response Unit and the Police Service Commission for misconduct. The police are supposed to arrest the person who seized the property for stealing and conversion, not to help him enforce an illegal seizure,” he added.

‘Police must separate debt from crime’

The Executive Director of the Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Centre, Okechukwu Nwanguma, said the circumstances surrounding the case raised questions about whether the police handled the matter in a professional and proportionate manner.

“The police are entitled to investigate a genuine allegation of assault or malicious damage to property. The fact that a dispute began over an N8,000 debt does not immunise anyone from investigation if a separate criminal offence was actually committed,” he said.

“But the police must clearly distinguish between investigating an alleged crime and using criminal process to enforce payment of a private debt.”

He said Section 32(2) of the Police Act 2020 prohibited arrest merely on the basis of a civil wrong or breach of contract.

“In this case, the significance of the N8,000 cannot simply be dismissed, particularly when it reportedly appears in the particulars contained in the charge sheet and the police themselves acknowledge that the dispute originated from it,” Nwanguma said.

He said an independent review should establish whether the allegations of assault and damage were investigated objectively or whether the criminal process became leverage for resolving the underlying financial dispute.

According to him, there was room for de-escalation and peaceful resolution of the underlying disagreement, provided the circumstances and wishes of the parties permitted it.

However, Nwanguma cautioned that alternative dispute resolution should not be used to turn the police into debt collectors.

Nwanguma said the death made an independent review necessary.

“The purpose should not be to prejudge individual officers, but to establish whether police powers were properly exercised and whether opportunities for lawful de-escalation were missed,” he said.

Nwanguma said investigators should reconstruct the entire chain of events, beginning with the original debt and alleged seizure of Al-Amin’s phone.

He listed the vigilante intervention, alleged phone damage and assault, police arrest and detention, any demands or conditions imposed for release, the decision to prosecute, the remand proceedings and events following Al-Amin’s release as matters that should be examined.

‘Suicide is never an option’

As the family continues to mourn, a psychologist, Bola Lawal, told Saturday PUNCH that the humiliation associated with debt, public embarrassment and detention could contribute to feelings of hopelessness in vulnerable people.

However, she stressed that suicide was not a solution to such circumstances.

“Suicide is never an option, no matter what happened or the situation a person is in. No matter how overwhelming the shame, debt or detention may feel, it is temporary. There is always help,” Lawal said.

She said people experiencing financial distress or public humiliation needed family support, counselling and professional intervention.