The Federal High Court in Lagos on Wednesday sentenced three men Kasumu Ademola, Salau Mikailu, and Ganiyu Ishola to 20 years imprisonment for defrauding a stock firm of N45.6m.

Justice Chukwuejekwu Aneke handed down the jail term after he found them guilty of the offence.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission had arraigned the convicts on four counts of conspiracy, unlawful fund conversion, and money laundering before the court to which they pleaded not guilty.

The convicts, who were first arraigned in 2019, had pleaded not guilty to all eight counts and they were admitted to bail on various terms.

However, the convicts in 2021, informed the court of their intentions to change their earlier not-guilty plea, and they pleaded guilty to the charges.

The three convicts were accused of conspiring and unlawfully converting 298,550 stocks of a deceased man, the late Joseph Adeyemi, valued at N34m.

They were also said to have unlawfully retained the aggregate of the sum of N9.481m, in their bank account.

At the resumed hearing of the case on Wednesday, the convicts’ lawyers, O Muyideen and A. Olufemi, in their plea for leniency, pleaded with the court to temper justice with mercy in sentencing the convicts, by considering that they have been in the detention since 2018 when they were first arrested.

Delivering judgment, Justice Aneke sentenced the convicts to five years in prison.