Nigerian retail tycoon Francis Atuche sentenced to jail for fraud after 10-year legal battle

A Nigerian high court has handed down a six-year jail sentence to retail tycoon Francis Atuche for defrauding the now-defunct Platinum Habib Bank (Bank PHB) of N25.7 billion ($62.68 million).

The former banking executive and owner of Hubmart, a local retail chain store, committed the crimes while serving as the bank’s managing director.

The Ikeja High Court sentenced Atuche after a trial that ran for 12 hours.

The case, which has been continuing for 10 years, was concluded by Justice Lateefa Okunnu, the court’s presiding judge.

Atuche, alongside an accomplice Ugo Anyanwu, a former chief financial officer at the bank, defrauded Bank PHB of billions of naira using well-recognized stockbrokers to transfer money belonging to the bank under the guise of loans and shares, Premium Times reported.

While Atuche was served a six-year jail term, his accomplice was handed a four-year term.

Issuing the ruling, Judge Okunnu said: “It was a well-planned, well-executed scheme, but the bubble burst when the Central Bank of Nigeria intervened.”

Both men were found guilty of 22 of 27 counts of conspiracy and stealing charges proffered against them by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission in 2011.

Although the two men pleaded for the court to temper justice with mercy, Okunnu found neither Atuche nor Anyanwu convincing as “witnesses of truth.”

“The first defendant (Atuche) was diversionary and evasive on the witness stand, sometimes confrontational and rude. The third defendant (Anyanwu) was also combative and rude under cross-examination,” Okunnu said.

Atuche was the founding managing director and CEO of Bank PHB. He assumed office in March 2000.