MISSING INFANT: COURT DIRECTS ONDO GOVERNMENT TO PAY N25M COMPENSATION
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By; Sunmola Ganiyat
An Ondo State High Court in Akure has ordered the state government and the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development to pay N25 million in damages to a woman whose infant son went missing while under the care of a state-run juvenile home.
Delivering judgment, Justice Oluyemi Akintan Osadebay found the government and the ministry liable for the disappearance of three-month-old Omoniyi Oluwaseun, the son of Mrs Opeyemi Adegboyega, who was placed in the Ondo State Juvenile Home in 2017.
The child had reportedly been entrusted to the Ministry of Women Affairs while his mother underwent treatment for depression and schizophrenia at the state Neuro-Psychiatric Hospital.
According to evidence presented before the court, Adegboyega was informed after her discharge that her son had died and that his body had been deposited in a mortuary. However, inquiries made at the State Specialist Hospital allegedly revealed that no corpse matching the infant’s description had been received from officials of the ministry.
Unsatisfied with the explanation surrounding her son’s disappearance, Adegboyega, through her lawyer, Oju Kekemeke, filed a suit against the state government and the ministry.
In his ruling, Justice Osadebay dismissed the defendants’ version of events, stating that the evidence provided lacked credibility and was not supported by documentation.
The court noted that the government failed to produce any records confirming the child’s death, injury, or any other verifiable account of what happened to him while in official custody. It further observed that no medical reports, mortuary documentation, or burial records were presented to substantiate claims that the infant had died.
Justice Osadebay concluded that the child’s disappearance resulted from the negligence of the defendants and held that the claimant suffered significant emotional pain, personal loss, and psychological trauma as a result.
Consequently, the court awarded N10 million as exemplary and aggravated damages, N15 million as general damages for emotional and psychological suffering, and N200,000 as the cost of the suit.
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