A petitioner’s counsel, Mr Kayode Adebisi, and lawyer for the police, Mr Francis Osie, clashed at the Friday hearing of the Osun State Panel of Judiciary Inquiry probing cases of police brutality.

Adebisi had appeared before the panel on behalf of his client, Paul Adeolu, a businessman, who accused the police of freeing members of a syndicate that swindled him out of N36m.

The businessman, in his petition to the panel, also claimed that the police also detained and tortured him over the issue.

The police officer, who was in charge of the businessman’s case, Muritala Alayande, appeared before the panel to defend the allegation of police compromise levelled by the businessman.


During cross-examination, the businessman’s lawyer, Adebisi, had confronted the policeman, Alayande, with the allegation that he tortured the businessman.

But responding to the question, the policeman said had he beaten Adebisi’s client, the man “would have been unconscious for three days.”

Miffed by the policeman’s response, the petitioner’s lawyer complained to the panel, a move that did not go down well with the police lawyer, Osei, who accused the petitioner’s counsel of misleading the panel.

Intervening, the chairman of the panel, Justice Akin Oladimeji (retd.), told the police counsel to refrain from the use of words that could make the matter he was defending messy.


He then adjourned further hearing in the matter till March 26, 2021.