Suspended UNICAL professor calls forensic analyst to counter ICPC’s evidence

A forensic analyst, Babagana Mingali, on Thursday, told the Federal High Court in Abuja that the mobile phone belonging to the suspended Dean of the Faculty of Law, University of Calabar (UNICAL), Cyril Ndifon, contained no data when he conducted a forensic analysis on it.

Mr Mingali, a Chief Superintendent of Police attached to the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA), appeared as the second defence witness (DW2) in the case brought against Mr Ndifon, a professor of law, and his lawyer, Samuel Anyanwu, by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).

Mr Ndifon’s defence team appears to have called the witness to counter the testimony of a prosecution witness, who testified about a year ago in the case that the complainant’s nude pictures were found on the law professor’s phones.

The ICPC charged Mr Ndifon with four counts of sexual harassment, cybercrime, and an attempt to pervert the course of justice.

The commission alleged that while serving as Dean of the Faculty of Law at UNICAL, Mr Ndifon asked a female diploma student, identified as TKJ, to send him pornographic, indecent, and obscene photographs of herself via WhatsApp.

His lawyer, Mr Anyanwu, was later added as a co-defendant following an amended on 22 January 2024, over allegations that he called one of the prosecution witnesses and threatened her during the pendency of the case.

Both Messrs Ndifon and Anyanwu pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Forensic analysis findings

Led in evidence by defence counsel Joe Agi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Mr Mingali narrated how he received a court letter dated 5 July 2024, directing him to conduct a forensic analysis on two mobile phones belonging to Messrs Ndifon and Anyanwu.

He told the court that he examined both phones at the NSA forensic laboratory and compiled a detailed report dated 8 August 2024, which was tendered as evidence.

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The trial judge, James Omotosho, admitted both the court letter and the forensic report as exhibits.

“My lord, we used the Universal forensic extraction device, a Touch Tool and some accompanied cable 2070 and cable 100, including some external storage devices in trying to extract the data,” he said.

When asked if he saw any naked photographs, email trails, voice recording, text messages and conversations, Mr Mingali said, “I did not find any”

He claimed people from other agencies, including the ICPC, have been posted to the NSA lab.

The analyst said no relevant information was found on the two phones between January 2021 up until January 2024 as the WhatsApp applications were out of date.

According to him, there was a need to return them to the owners to update it to achieve the desired result.

Cross-examination of witness

During cross-examination, ICPC’s counsel, Osuobeni Akponimisingha, questioned Mr Mingali on his forensic expertise.

The witness said he had been actively practising forensic analysis for about five years.

Mr Mingali insisted that ICPC officials were posted to the NSA forensic lab, though he admitted he did not have their posting letters as evidence to support his claim.

He acknowledged that the Nigerian Police, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), and the ICPC all have forensic laboratories, but he had never personally seen the ICPC’s forensic facility.

The analyst confirmed that the ICPC used the same forensic tool (Touch Tool) as his office to extract images from Mr Ndifon’s phone, which the commission had previously presented as Exhibit H.

When asked whether further analysis could reveal more data, he admitted that new findings might emerge if the WhatsApp application was updated and re-examined.

What prosecution witness earlier said about extracts from professor’s phones

Earlier in February 2024, the fourth prosecution witness, Bwaigu Fungo, who is a forensic and intelligence analyst with ICPC, testified before the court about how he analysed three nude videos obtained from Mr Ndifon’s Oppo phone.

Two phones of Oppo and Tecno brands said to have been recovered from Mr Ndifon were tendered by the prosecution and admitted by the court as Exhibits N and O.

He said the videos, which were videos of TKJ as requested by Mr Ndifon, were extracted from Exhibit N belonging to the professor.

“The videos as sent by TKJ to the Exhibit N (Oppo phone owned by Ndifon) are usually sent by the 1st defendant to another subscriber (another phone number),” the witness said.

He said though about 16 videos were extracted, three were TKJ’s videos.

He said TKJ made the videos on 26 September 2023.

The witness also played three of the videos of other female students but the judge directed him to limit it to videos relevant to the charge, which were TKJ’s.

When asked why Mr Ndifon would have forwarded the videos sent to him by TKJ to another phone number, Mr Fungo said it was to preserve the video for whatever reason.

Mr Akponimisingha also requested for Exhibit O (Tecno Phone) and the witness was asked questions on some of the extractions.

Mr Agi, while cross-examining Mr Fungo, asked if TKJ shot the video involuntarily, from the videos he played

“The acts of TKJ were involuntarily done,” the witness responded.

In January PREMIUM TIMES reported that Mr Ndifon testified in his own defence as the first defence witness (DW1). He told the court that he had previously been cleared of similar allegations by former Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Solomon Arase and former Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) Abubakar Malami.

He said both officials had reviewed his case and concluded that he had no case to answer.

Mr Ndifon further alleged that a member of the ICPC prosecution team, Adekunle Sogunle, had a personal interest in his case.

He claimed that Mr Sogunle was among the initial investigators and later signed the first charge that brought him to court.

He also pointed out that Mr Sogunle received an award from UNICAL, suggesting possible bias.

Mr Omotosho admitted several documents, pictures, and records of court proceedings as exhibits in support of Mr Ndifon’s claims, despite objections from the ICPC prosecution team.