Toyosi: The offense of raising false alarm

by Stanley Alieke, Esq.

A twenty old lady named Toyosi raised an SOS alert yesterday that she was kidnapped and raped by a gang of men. She went ahead to share the location of where she was held hostage and the phone numbers of her abductors.

Twitter users immediately contacted security operatives who swung into action and arrived at the shared location as soon as possible and arrested every male available and on sight in that apartment and took them to the police station.

While this was going on, the alleged victim, Toyosi made another live video that she was never kidnapped nor raped, that she was only chasing clouts and didn’t know that it would escalate. This incident got everyone talking because, at this critical point where there are so many cases of insecurity in the country, no one needs to chase clout with sensitive matters like this.

She was later arrested by the police who thought that her story needed to be straightened up and that there is more to the story than she is willing to divulge.

The POLICE PRO of Lagos state, Mr. Benjamin Hundeyin later wrote: “After a careful and extensive investigation, it is revealed that 20-year-old Toyosi Adesegun, female, is a regular visitor to Olamilekan Faruk, Ayanfe Ayinde and Olusola Onipede, all male of 78 Obayan Street Akoka. This morning, she was restrained from leaving the apartment by the young men.

Toyosi threatened to tweet what she tweeted if she was not allowed to leave. The young men called her bluff and she tweeted. Based on the foregoing, the three men will be arraigned for wrongful restraint, while Toyosi will be arraigned for giving false information”.

We should categorically state here that giving false information to the law enforcement agencies and raising a false alarm is an offense. “Whoever, knowing or having reason to believe that an offense has been committed, gives any information regarding that offense which he knows or believes to be false, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term or with fine, or with both”

It is an offense to give false information to the police, and this offender when tried can be punished with up to 6 months imprisonment and or a fine in accordance with relevant laws.

The offense of giving false information or raising a false alarm falls under the category of a strict liability offense. This means that providers who are knowing, reckless or wilful in giving false or misleading information would be committing an offense, it does not matter whether you are ignorant or not or had cause to believe that the information you gave is true or not.

You are expected to take all reasonable steps to make sure that the information you are giving is true and credible.

Giving false information to law enforcement is a criminal offense, It becomes false information when the police or other law enforcement agency acted on the information you supplied believing the same to be true.

Ms. Toyosi will be charged with the criminal offense of intentionally giving false information and causing nuisance and disturbance of the public peace. She risks getting a jail term of up to 6 months or more than.

Stanley Alieke is a lawyer based in Abuja.
infoitooknow@gmail.com