Okafor Ofiebor/ Port Harcourt

A 47- year- old Nigerian woman based in the United States of America,  Lois Obazi, has been jailed 10 years after she was found guilty of child-trafficking by a Magistrate Court in Port Harcourt.

According to court documents, Obazi had in 2018 disguised with a quasi-name, ‘Precious Obasi’  living around Omehia School Road, Igwuruta community in the Ikwerre Local Government Area of Rivers State to ‘buy’ three children.

The suspect was arrested in a hotel on Stadium Road, Elekahia, in Port Harcourt City Local Government Area before she was arraigned in court.

She claimed that she gave birth to the three children on two different days in a maternity home at Igwuruta.

But Chief Magistrate, Felicitas Amanze in her judgment, held that evidence before the court proved that Obasi bought the three infants.

She therefore sentenced the woman to three years  imprisonment on count one, and seven years imprisonment on count two of the charges preferred against her, adding that the terms would run concurrently.

The chief magistrate noted that it was impossible for Obazi to have left overseas to return to Nigeria to deliver triplets and also nurse them in a hotel as she claimed, stressing that the prosecution counsel proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.

Meanwhile, the defence counsel, Chris Nwadigo , said the judgment was ‘full of emotion and sentiment’, and vowed to appeal it.