How a Flawed Judicial Process Incarcerated Photographer for 10 Months in Prison for ‘Intentional Insult’

Amidst allegations of abuse of power and a flawed judicial process, Sunday Ehigiator investigates the disturbing case of a former employee of Pesther Photo Studio, Nicholas Peter, who was arrested and imprisoned for over 10 months, for resigning from his job through ‘an insulting text’

On August 28, 2024, a disturbing story surfaced on social media platform X (formerly Twitter) involving Nicholas Peter, a 26-year-old photographer.

Human Rights Lawyer Funke Adeoye, a prominent advocate and convener of the ‘Hope Behind Bars’ movement, in her tweet, alleged that Nicholas’ former employer, Oluwole Mike, owner of Pesther Photo Studio in the Federal Capital Territory, had misused his political connections to harass and detain Nicholas for over 10 months. The reason? Nicholas had resigned from his job at the studio.

The Allegation

Adeoye’s tweet read: “This is Nicholas. A 26 year old graduate, photographer & Keyboardist.

“Sometime in October 2023, Nicholas sent a text message to his boss resigning his role as a photographer in the photo studio. His boss was angry at the content of the text message & got him arrested.

“From spending 2 days in police detention, he ended up being charged for intentional insult”, locked up in a room with 189 other cellmates at a prison in Keffi because he could not afford the bail sum initially N100,000 & later N50,000.

“He remained there even after the said boss, a politician in the current administration & owner of a popular photography studio in FCT wrote a letter to the court withdrawing the charge.

“Two weeks ago, someone hinted @hopebehindbar about Nicholas’s plight and @thehassanian reached out to a friend of his who donated N50,000 anonymously.

“The first picture is a picture of Nicholas 2 months before prison, the second is a picture of him when we got him out last week and the third is a picture of him at @hopebehindbar office today.

“After working in this space for 6 years, You’d think that we have heard the worst stories but it keeps getting crazier. Imagine spending 10 months in prison for sending a resignation text to your boss.

“Name of Boss: Oluwole Mike, Owner of Pesther Photostudio in FCT and Publisher of One Nigeria Television.”

She would later ask to send Nicholas’s account details to emails of people willing to support him, as the post began to galvanise public empathy and criticism of Pesther studio boss, who was also rumoured to be related to the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Kayode Egbetokun.

Mike Reacts, Accuses Nicholas of Theft

Following the allegation, THISDAY reached out to Nicholas’ former employer, Mike to get his side of the story.

Reacting to the allegation, Oluwole narrated, “I had never met Nicholas before he visited my branch, offering to sell me a prime lens. My photographer verified the lens’s quality, and I agreed to purchase it, despite having bought a new one the previous week. Nicholas came to my head office, and we negotiated a price of 35,000, which I paid him.

“When I asked about the lens’s ownership, he claimed it belonged to him and his friend, who was supposedly ill and needed 25,000 for medical expenses. I asked for the receipt, which he said was at home, and told him to bring it the next day. He wrote a note confirming ownership and promising to bring the receipt but never did. Despite this, I paid him the agreed amount, and he left.

“What happened next was that Nicholas returned to my office the following week, complimenting me on its beauty and organization. He expressed his desire to work for me, claiming to be a skilled photographer.

“I agreed to give him a chance, offering him a test assignment. He passed the test, and I hired him despite his lack of formal certification. Initially, I was impressed with his work and paid him a starting salary of 70,000, with the promise of a raise after six months or a year.

“However, things took a turn for the worse when Nicholas began behaving strangely towards my customers. He would bully them, fail to complete photo shoots and leave his camera for others to finish the job.

“When I confronted him, he claimed he needed money and didn’t belong at the studio. One day, I found him unresponsive and bent over at his desk, which frightened me.

“After snapping him out of it, he confessed that he needed money and shared his troubled past, including being expelled from missionary school for jumping over the fence. Despite sensing dishonesty, I chose to mentor him and assigned staff to guide him.

“After three months of employment, Nicholas requested a 20,000 IOU, which I granted without interest, as I sometimes do for staff in emergencies. However, shortly after receiving his salary and the IOU, he suddenly quit via text message. When I asked him to repay the 20,000, he ignored me and later sent an insulting message, which angered me.

“I then got prompted by instinct that he may have gone with the lens I bought from him and decided to take inventory of all my studio equipment. This was when I discovered that my office phone which consists of all the contacts of our clients which we have built for over five years was missing.

“Hence we decided to review the studio’s security footage, to ascertain who took it. The CCTV footage showed Nicholas leaving the office with a colleague, and then returning alone to retrieve the phone. He had cleverly switched off the camera power at the changeover point, allowing him to take the phone without being detected.

“I reported the incident to the police, who presented Nicholas with the evidence. Despite this, he denied returning to the office and taking the phone. The police arrested him on Saturday and charged him in court on Monday.

“I offered to give him the phone, worth N145,000 if he would let me retrieve my customers’ contacts, but he refused. The DPO (Divisional Police Officer) was lenient and advised him to confess, but Nicholas continued to deny the allegations.

“Despite Nicholas’ continued denial, the truth began to unravel in court. It was revealed that he had been previously convicted of stealing cameras and photo equipment from his friends, and one of those friends identified the prime lens camera which he sold to me as his own.

“The friend explained that Nicholas had a history of dishonesty, including an incident where he claimed his external hard drive was stolen, only to have it mysteriously reappear after a threat from a herbalist.

“Nicholas continued to call me from jail, and eventually, a pastor from the prison in Keffi contacted me. The pastor was furious with Nicholas and scolded him for betraying my trust.

“Nicholas apologised, and the pastor offered to mediate a resolution. After some discussion, it was agreed that Nicholas would be released if I paid N20,000. I agreed to pay, and the pastor provided a contact to arrange the payment.

“I asked Nicholas for his lawyer’s account number to pay the agreed N20,000, but he provided someone else’s account number instead. He also failed to ensure the full amount was paid, as the person using his account collected N6,000 from the money.

“When they appeared in court without a lawyer, the judge dismissed them. Nicholas then asked me to retrieve the money from the first person, which became a problem. The barrister had to intervene to recover the remaining amount.

“Nicholas called me again, and I forwarded the money to another account number provided by the pastor, but it wasn’t the barrister’s account. This delayed his release.

“By November, I wanted to resolve the issue, and my wife suggested forgiving him. I wrote a letter to the judge, but it didn’t secure his release. I then appealed to others for help.

“Nicholas sent various people to me, claiming his father was an Army General and his mother a prominent businesswoman in Ghana. However, his friends revealed that his mother was actually ill, and they had previously sent him to jail for stealing their cameras.

“Others called me, saying Nicholas had stolen laptops, cameras, and studio lights from a private school in Abuja and disappeared. I urged them to show mercy, hoping for his release.

“Last week, Nicholas appeared in my office around 9:30-10 am. When Nicholas arrived, I asked how he was doing. He replied that he had just been released from prison and had nothing.

“I inquired about his intentions, and he expressed a desire to return to work. I explained that I couldn’t reemploy him, so I asked what else he needed. He requested financial assistance.

“I consulted with three staff members who knew him, seeking their input on how much to give. I offered options of N5,000, N10,000, N15,000, or N20,000. The oldest staff member, a female, suggested giving him N20,000, citing my previous mention of that amount.

“I agreed but tried to transfer the funds, which was unsuccessful due to network issues. We resorted to using a POS machine, and I instructed Nicholas to write a receipt for the N20,000. However, the total amount paid was N20,400 due to transaction fees. He left with the money on August 16, 2024.

“Last Friday, Nicholas messaged me that he had found a job, and I congratulated him. However, he then asked for money for transportation, despite having received N20,000 from me just days prior.

“He claimed he owed many people and needed to pay them. I offered to send him N5,000, but the network connection failed. He continuously called me on Sunday morning, demanding payment, which angered me. I told him not to call me again.

“Despite my anger, I tried to transfer N5,000 to him using office WiFi, but the bad network connection prevented it. Later that day, someone called me, cursing their enemies, and I responded with ‘back to sender in Jesus’ name.

“Then, a person messaged me, claiming to know me and saying they didn’t like what they were hearing about me on social media. They sent me screenshots of posts from a 31-year-old Yoruba lady who was blackmailing me without contacting me first. She claimed I had imprisoned Nicholas due to my alleged connection to the IGP, which is false.”

Nicholas Reacts

Reacting to the allegation of theft, being an ex-convict, and wanting to return to working for Pesther Studio levelled against him by his boss, Nicholas, while speaking with THISDAY, denied it all.

According to him, “May God forbid it that I ever think of such. I am a highly skilled photographer and so many people want me to work for them. What would make me think of going to work with Pesther?

“And it is not true that I stole my friend’s lens and sold it to him. It’s not true. Also, I’ve never been convicted.

“What happened was that I went to an event with my friend’s camera and mine along with a camera that was given to me by a school I was working with. I went for that job with two of my friends. It was that night that I was robbed and my whole bag was taken with those gadgets in it.

“It was days later that my friend took us to court for ‘breach of trust’ but he withdrew the case six weeks afterwards. So I don’t know what Pesther is saying. I was even the one who told him all this.

“And also, it was not the same camera lens that was stolen from me before I met him that I sold to him. The one I sold to him was for another person. He’s just lying.

“And his other allegation that I stole a friend’s terabyte is ridiculous. Which of my friends would I be working for? I trained almost all my friends who are into photography, so how would I be working for them again?

“Now Pesther took me to prison because I sent him a text and he alleged that I took his office phone, whatever it was that happened between me and my friend is not his business. He should face what’s on the ground and stop trying to deflect attention. If my friend wants a case against me, let him advise him to sue me then.”

On how he met Mike also known as Pesther and why he decided to resign, he said, “It was when I went to sell a friend’s lens to him that he told me he needed a skilled photographer and an editor. That was how I presented myself and we began working.

“I saw him humiliate a colleague, Shadrach, because he collected money from a customer through his account. He had that boy locked in the cell for two days just because of that. That was when I had the thought of looking for a better place. I worked for him not up to three months before I resigned.

“I tendered my resignation on the 10th of October 2023, it was on the 15th of October that he came to arrest me because I sent him, as he claims, ‘an insulting text’ on the 14^th of October.

“The text message that he said was an insult was what triggered the arrest. He just placed the phone thing on me to have a very strong case against me. There were CCTV cameras in the office, why didn’t he check it?

“He claims that I went to switch it off, but there is a camera by the side so it could have captured whoever it was that tried to switch it off. Did he see me switch it off? Then let him bring the footage.”

Asked about the N20,000, and Case-withdrawal letter Mike said he sent to the court for his release, Nicholas said, “He sent money to a warden, N20,000 but the court refused the money so the warden refunded the money to Pesther, and Pesther confirmed it. I had to report the warden to the in-charge of the prison before he sent the money back to Pesther.

“Actually on his part, he tried because he wrote a letter to the court asking them to discharge the case, but they refused and were asking for N50,000. It was the warden who told him to pay N20,000 initially, and that he’ll talk to the judge but the judge declined it.

“When my lawyer took the letter to court, they would have discharged me if it was honoured, but the judge declined the money and didn’t honour the letter because they asked Pesther to bring the letter himself.

“That was what the prosecutor said, ‘That the complainant should come to court himself if he wanted to withdraw the case’. I informed Pesther about this, but he said he was too busy and would not be able to go to court, this was around March 2024. So that was how I remained in custody till Hope Behind Bars came to my rescue.

“So, Pesther wasn’t instrumental in my release. It was hope behind bars that helped secure my release. They reached out and sent the N50,000 that was demanded by the court to the welfare officer who forwarded the money to the registrar in court, so Pesther did not take part in my release.”

Speaking on circumstances that could have led to his 10-month awaiting trial, till his eventual release, he said, “First, I wasn’t convicted. The judge did not convict me in court. I was only awaiting trial for these 10 months because I couldn’t meet up with my bail conditions. So I’ll say it’s our bad judiciary system that caused it.

“It was the first day I was taken to court, on October 17, 2023. that I was granted bail, on the condition of N300,000 or provided a reliable surety, but I couldn’t meet up with the bail condition. I didn’t appeal. I couldn’t meet it otherwise I would have been out since before now.

“So when they took me to court again, they had changed the judge and brought in another one who started mentioning the case from the beginning but didn’t grant me bail.

“At some point, the new judge also set bail conditions of N300,000 or a reliable surety in likesome for me, but I was later taken to court again as I couldn’t pay that sum again and nobody signed the surety for me.

“But by then, they had called off all upper area courts in FCT and said they no longer have jurisdiction to trial criminal cases. So I was asked to pay N50,000. They asked my lawyer to bring the money so they’ll strike the case off.”

On the type of justice he would like to get to get closure, he said, “First I was factually innocent of the charges against me and there were procedural errors that violated my rights. No investigation was done by the police; I spent a whole 10 months for nothing.

“Well, I don’t want to fight over it. If I were him, I’d call me for mediation. I thought Pesther would have called me. Instead, he’s going about telling people another story that doesn’t even relate to what’s going on, trying to divert attention.”

THISDAY Findings

THISDAY obtained a screenshot of evidence of the resignation text message sent by Nicholas to his boss, which his boss alleged to be insulting, and the ensuing conversation.

The message first sent on Tuesday, October 10, 2023, and delivered at exactly 11:01 pm, read: “Good morning sir. Just to make the notice that today would be my last day working with @pestherphotostudios.” But there was no response to this message from his boss.

In a follow-up message sent by Nicholas on Friday, October 13, 2023, at exactly 10:22 pm, he said, “Thanks to God, what I wanted came up on time and I had to leave Pesther early.

“I think you have to learn so many things about leadership and management. I never trusted you from my first day at work, judging from the many times you spoke. I am an intuitive psychologist.

“It was good that I wasn’t Shadrach that you humiliated. I lost every semblance of value I had placed on you ever since you wrongfully maltreated that dude.

“Well, I am off to be on my own now and yes, the real reason I called earlier was to let you know how unfair you are and what you have to do to become better. Sire! Goodbye.”

Responding to Nicholas the next day, Saturday, October 14, at exactly 11:48 pm, Mike wrote, “I give you today to pay back my N30,000, or else, the law will take its course.”

We also obtained evidence of a withdrawal receipt of N20,400 from a POS machine, which Mike claimed to have assisted Nicholas with upon his arrival from prison, and also obtained an ‘undated’ case withdrawal letter sent by Mike to the court.

Furthermore, after hearing Mike’s side of the story, THISDAY contacted Mrs Adeoye, Convener of the ‘Hope Behind Bars’ movement, to verify the counter allegations made by Mike regarding the incident.

Mike had previously stated that the court-set bail amount for Nicholas’ release was N20,000, contradicting Nicholas and Adeoye’s claim of N50,000.

Additionally, Mike alleged that if Adeoye indeed paid N50,000, it would not have been deposited into a government account, but rather used as a bribe paid into a corrupt prison warder’s account to facilitate Nicholas’ escape from prison.

Furthermore, he accused Adeoye of not fact-checking Nicholas’s story from him at any point, before sharing untrue and defamatory information concerning him on her social media handle, and threatened to take legal action against her.

In response to Mike’s allegations, Adeoye acknowledged that the N50,000 payment was made into a personal account, not a government account, and she later realised it was a bribe since no receipt was provided.

Additionally, Adeoye admitted to not verifying Nicholas’ claims with Mike before publishing her statements on social media and acknowledged that Nicholas visited Mike after his release and received a gift of N20,000 from him.

According to her, “Nicholas was referred to us by Yiaga Africa, a personal organization, with a request to pay his bail. We sourced funds and paid the N50,000 bail, despite not having full details of the case.

“Further investigation revealed that the N50,000 we paid was a bribe, not a bail sum. This discovery raised more questions. Nicholas’ last court appearance was in January at an Abuja court.

“Later, in March or May, the Chief Judge ordered a temporary closure of all area courts in Abuja. During this time, Nicholas’ boss submitted a letter withdrawing the case, stating he no longer wished to pursue it.

“Despite this, we were initially told the bail sum was N100,000, which was later reduced to N50,000. These inconsistencies suggest a complex and potentially corrupt situation. The money was paid to a personal account.

“Afterwards, a team member visited the correctional facility, where we have established connections, and made the payment without seeing the charge sheet. Nicholas claimed he was charged with ‘Intentional Insult and Theft’.

“After his release, we invited him to our office to discuss the next steps. He planned to stay with a friend and also wanted to visit his former boss, Mike, to show him the impact of his actions. Our colleague advised against it, but Nicholas insisted. After meeting Mike, Nicholas returned to our office and reported that Mike had given him N20,000.

“Many have been wondering what constitutes ‘Intentional Insult’ and whether it is a criminal offence. Yes, it is indeed a crime under the criminal code. Moreover, Nicholas faced an additional allegation of theft. I reviewed the text message that led to his arrest five days later.

“At the police station, the message was printed, and Nicholas was questioned about why he would send such a message to an elderly person. Furthermore, his former boss accused him of stealing his phone when he left, resulting in an additional charge. We also have recordings from Nicholas’ former colleague urging him to apologise to his boss, saying ‘Come and beg boss’.

“I made it clear to Nicholas that I wasn’t interested in past events, but rather the truth about what happened. He mentioned that ‘intentional insult’ was the primary charge during our conversation.

“Currently, we are still awaiting the official charge sheet from the court, as the correctional service didn’t have it. However, all the information we’ve shared so far is based on our discussions with the correctional officers. I don’t see why his past should be relevant to this situation.”

The flawed judicial system in the country may have contributed to Nicholas’s prolonged pre-trial detention of 10 months. Nevertheless, Nicholas views his initial arrest, which led to his extended imprisonment, as unjustified, motivated by malice, and deserving of condemnation.

Quote