The six suspects in the April 14, 2014 Nyanya bomb blast have told a Federal High Court in Abuja yesterday that they were beaten and tortured by the operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS) to get confessional statements from them.

The accused persons, Aminu Sadiq Ogwuche, Ahmed Abubakar, Mohammed Ishaq, Ya’u Saidu (alias Kofar Rama); Anas Isa, Adamu Yusuf and Nasir Abubakar are facing charges bothering on terrorism.

Counsel to the suspects led by Mr Ahmed Raji (SAN) objected to the admissibility of the statement of the DSS when the prosecuting counsel, who is also the Director of Public Prosecution (DSS) sought to tender the statements as exhibits against the accused persons in court.

Raji, in his submission told the court that the statement by Ogwuche was obtained through severe beating and torture and should not be admitted as evidence by the court since it was not voluntarily given.

In the same vein, counsel to the second accused person, Abdul Mohammed urged the court not to admit the statement of his client as it was obtained under severe torture.

Mohammed then prayed the court to conduct trial-with-in trial to ascertain the voluntariness of the statements of the accused persons, which the prosecution sought to tender.

Responding, the prosecution counsel, Diri urged the trial Judge, Justice Ahmed Ramat Mohammed to dis-countenance the submissions of the defence counsel.

Adding that the statements of all the accused persons were voluntarily obtained, contrary to the submissions of defence counsel.

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