An Ekiti State High Court sitting in Ado-Ekiti has sentenced a 37-year-old woman, Deborah Ayeni, to 14 years in prison for child stealing and declared her a fugitive after she failed to appear in court during her trial.
Justice Lekan Olatawura handed down the sentence on Tuesday after Ayeni’s sureties failed to produce her in court despite the prosecution having called four witnesses.
The judge also ordered the court registrar to forward the judgment and a letter to the Comptroller-General of Customs, the Nigeria Police Force and the media, declaring Ayeni wanted and directing that she be apprehended.
Olatawura ordered that the 14-year sentence should take effect immediately upon her arrest.
The judge also sentenced Ayeni’s two sureties, including her father, Mr Babatope Ebenezer Ayeni, to six months’ imprisonment for failing to produce her in court and pay the required recognizance fees, in line with the Administration of Criminal Justice Law of Ekiti State, 2014, as amended.
The court had earlier revoked Ayeni’s bail after she repeatedly failed to appear to answer the charge against her.
Ayeni pleaded not guilty to the one-count charge of child stealing when she was first arraigned on Sept. 1, 2025.
The prosecution, led by Mrs Ibironke Odetola, told the court that Ayeni, on Aug. 4, 2025, in Ado-Ekiti, allegedly stole a newborn baby belonging to Mustapher Aliu and his wife, Falmata, with the intention of depriving them of the child.
Odetola said Ayeni was granted bail after her arrest and detention at the Ado-Ekiti Correctional Center in the sum of N2 million, with two sureties required to enter recognizance in the same amount.
The prosecutor said the prosecution called four witnesses during the trial, but Ayeni stopped appearing in court while the third witness was being presented.
According to her, Ayeni told her counsel, Mr Stephen Ademuagun, that she had been kidnapped along the road, after which she failed to return to court.
Odetola said Ayeni’s father, one of her sureties, appeared in court on one occasion and claimed that his daughter was at home when the judge questioned him about her whereabouts.
The prosecutor further told the court that Ayeni had allegedly lost a pregnancy in May 2025 but lied to her husband, who lives abroad, that she was pregnant and due for delivery in an attempt to conceal the loss and preserve her marriage.
She said Ayeni invited her husband to Nigeria for the purported delivery and used clothes wrapped around her stomach to create the appearance of pregnancy.
According to Odetola, Ayeni later went to a hospital in the Okeyinmi area of Ado-Ekiti, where she allegedly stole the complainants’ newborn baby.
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“She then gave the baby to a midwife for care after lying to her husband that she had buried the placenta upon questioning.
“It was the midwife, who noticed the anomalies in her activities, that informed the police and she was promptly arrested,” she said.
Odetola said the police later rescued the baby alive. The offense, according to the prosecutor, contravened Section 292 of the Criminal Law of Ekiti State, 2021.
