An officer of the Department of State Services, DSS, on Wednesday told a Federal High Court how cell phone analysis of the five men being prosecuted for allegedly carrying out the June 5, 2022 attack on St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo, Ondo State, placed them at the crime scene.

The officer told the court that phone calls made by the defendants, Idris Abdulmalik Omeiza (25), Al Qasim Idris (20), Jamiu Abdulmalik (26), Abdulhaleem Idris (25) and Momoh Otuho Abubakar (47), around the time of the attack placed them in the vicinity of St. Francis Catholic Church, Owo.

He disclosed that the DSS had sufficient technical evidence to show that the first to fourth defendants were around the church premises during the attack.

The DSS officer explained that the technical evidence showed that their phones and conversations were traced to telecommunications cell site locations around the scene of the attack.

Aside from the phone records analysis conducted by the DSS, the officer said the defendants voluntarily made confessional statements linking them to the attack.

The witness said the statement-taking session was witnessed by the Director of the Legal Aid Council after the defendants stated that they could not afford to have either their lawyers or family members present during the session.

He identified the five defendants, giving details of how he obtained the confessional statements from the first to fourth defendants, which he said were made voluntarily.

An objection raised by the defence lawyer, Abdullahi Mohammad, to the admissibility of the defendants’ statements was overruled by the trial judge, Justice Emeka Nwite.

In a ruling, the judge also rejected Mohammad’s request that the court order a trial-within-trial to resolve doubts about whether or not the defendants made the statements.

Justice Nwite upheld the submission by prosecuting lawyer, Ayodeji Adedipe (SAN), that a trial-within-trial could only be ordered where the issue concerns the voluntariness of a statement, and not where a defendant denies making it, as in this case.

Adedipe had, after the 10th prosecution witness, identified as SSJ, gave evidence on how he obtained the confessional statements from the first to fourth defendants, applied to tender them in evidence.

Mohammad objected to the admissibility of the statements and urged the court to order a trial-within-trial on the grounds that the statements were not made by his clients.

Testifying earlier under cross-examination by Mohammad, the ninth prosecution witness, SSI, insisted that the defendants were involved in the attack and gave further details of the DSS investigation.

SSI, who told the court on Tuesday that he led the investigation team, restated that the defendants were arrested in August 2022 in Kogi and Ondo states, and were later interviewed in Abuja.

He confirmed that all the defendants are members of ISWAP and belong to a cell operating as Al Shabab. He added that there is also a Mahmuda group of ISWAP in the area.

The witness told the court that after the attack, the fourth defendant returned the weapons used in the attack to Odoba and also returned the car to where he had rented it.

SSI confirmed that the case was thoroughly investigated and that evidence indicting the defendants was duly obtained.

The witness also confirmed that the defendants used two vehicles during the attack, adding that while they drove in a rented vehicle to the church, they snatched another vehicle from a worshipper who was returning from the service, which they used as a getaway vehicle.

He further confirmed that the defendants had a meeting at Government Secondary School, Ogaminana, where one Odoba gave instructions to the second defendant regarding the attack.

The meeting, the witness said, preceded two other meetings held on June 3 and 4, 2022, before the attack.

SSI confirmed that the defendants used both explosives and several rounds of ammunition during the attack.

He insisted that no other persons outside the defendants were arrested by the DSS in connection with the case.

Further trial in the case resumes on February 19.