When Magistrate courts become holding bays for police abuse
By Okechukwu Nwanguma
One of the most dangerous distortions of justice in Nigeria today is not merely police brutality; it is the quiet, routine way Magistrate Courts are used to sanitise illegality.
When courts that ought to be the first line of protection for citizens instead become conveyor belts to prolonged detention, the rule of law collapses from within.
The ordeal of Hajiya Mrs. Ngozi Umunna-Ishola, recently remanded from Dutse Alhaji Magistrate Court 2, is a chilling example of how police abuse and judicial indifference can combine to destroy lives.
She was arrested late at night on 10 December 2025 by officers from Garki Police Station, Abuja, without a warrant, without a prior complaint, and without any reasonable suspicion of crime. At the time of her arrest, she was unwell, menstruating, and forced to abandon two very young children—both with special needs—without care arrangements. What followed was not an investigation, but punishment.
She was detained for days without access to a lawyer, her family, food, water, or prescribed medication. She was pressured to write a statement. When she resisted, the punishment escalated.
The allegation later concocted against her—that she was blackmailing a man who had allegedly subjected her to unwanted sexual advances—should have triggered a careful, gender-sensitive investigation. Instead, the police aligned themselves with the complainant, allowing him to harass and assault her in custody, and turning the criminal process into a tool of intimidation.
But it was what happened next that exposed the deeper institutional rot.
On 12 December 2025, she was told she was being taken to the Area Command. Instead, she was secretly diverted to Dutse Alhaji Magistrate Court 2, a court far removed from the station where she was detained. She was denied access to her phones, held in a vehicle for hours under armed guard, prevented from making calls, and denied the dignity of using the toilet. This was not an oversight; it was orchestration.
Inside the courtroom, she stood alone. No notice. No lawyer. An unknown person purported to speak on her behalf. The prosecutor even misrepresented the date of her arrest. Yet, despite clear constitutional violations staring the court in the face, the Magistrate did not ask the most basic questions: Why was she arrested? Why was she detained for days? Why was she denied counsel? Why was she secretly brought before this court? Instead, when bail was orally requested in a clearly bailable matter, the Magistrate insisted—rigidly—that only a written application would be entertained and ordered her remand to Suleja Correctional Centre. That single decision cost a woman over one month of her liberty.
Her lawyers filed a written bail application promptly. A hearing date was fixed. Yet on the appointed day, the case was not called. No explanation. No urgency. She spent Christmas and the New Year behind bars—not because the law required it, but because the system did not care enough to act.
She was only released after the Federal Ministry of Justice, through the Solicitor-General, intervened and declined to oppose bail. That intervention alone exposes the emptiness of the earlier remand.
Magistrates are not clerks of the police. They are constitutionally bound to protect liberty, scrutinise detention, and prevent abuse. The Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) was enacted precisely to end the culture of mechanical remand orders and secret arraignments. When a Magistrate ignores these safeguards, the courtroom becomes an extension of the police cell.
This case also reveals how women are uniquely brutalised by the system. Detained with male suspects. Denied privacy and sanitation. Humiliated. Threatened with prison unless money is produced. Even during transit to Suleja, she was subjected to degrading treatment so severe that she urinated on herself after being denied access to a toilet. This is not law enforcement; it is cruelty.
Equally disturbing is the continued retention and suspected tampering with her seized phones—an act that raises serious concerns about evidence manipulation and digital intrusion.
What happened to Hajiya Ngozi is not an isolated incident. It is part of a pattern where:- Police arrest first and investigate later;- Magistrates remand first and ask questions never; – Vulnerable citizens are crushed between both.
If Magistrate Courts are allowed to continue functioning as holding bays for police abuse, no constitutional guarantee is safe. Liberty becomes conditional. Justice becomes arbitrary.
Judicial oversight bodies must act—not defensively, but decisively. Silence in the face of such conduct is complicity. Accountability is not an attack on judicial independence; it is its foundation.
- A justice system that cannot protect the weak from abuse has already failed. And a society that normalises such failure should not be surprised when injustice becomes the norm.
