By LUCY OSUIZIGBO-OKECHUKWU

The Anambra State Children, Sexual and Gender-based Violence Offences Court sitting in Awka has remanded a 72-year-old doctor and two women for allegedly stealing and selling a seven-year-old boy.

The defendants, Dr Daniel Ikebuilo, 72, Ifunanya Ogbonna, 23 and Chidiogo Ogbonna, 20, had pleaded not guilty to a five count-charge of conspiracy, child stealing, illegal deal and sale of a child.

The Chief Magistrate, Mrs U.E. Onochie, ordered the defendants to be remanded at the Awka Correctional Centre before adjourning the case until Aug.13 for ruling on the bail application.

The prosecutor, Insp. Chinyere Okechukwu had earlier told the court that the defendants committed the offences on April 30, at Okpoko in Onitsha.

Okechukwu said that the two female defendants conspired and fraudulently took away the seven-year-old boy, from his mother, Kosarachukwu Okpala.

?They sold the boy to the doctor for N700,000 and the doctor later re-sold the child for N2.3 million,? she said.

Okechukwu claimed that the offences contravened Sections 495(a) and 321 of the Criminal Code, Laws of Anambra, 1991, as amended.

She added that the offences also violated Section 31(1) (4) of the state?s Child Rights Law of 2004 and Section 15(1) of the Violence Against Persons Prohibition and Protection Law of Anambra State of Nigeria, 2017.

The prosecutor urged the court to remand the defendants, noting that Ifunanya Ogbonna and Dr Ikebuilo had earlier been arraigned on March 5, for similar offences.

?Immediately after they perfected their bail application following the March arraignment, they stole another child in April,? she stated. (NAN)

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