Embattled Senator Ike Ekweremadu, his wife, Beatrice and a medical middleman, Dr Obinna Obeta have been jailed for conspiring to traffic a market trad
Embattled Senator Ike Ekweremadu, his wife, Beatrice and a medical middleman, Dr Obinna Obeta have been jailed for conspiring to traffic a market trader to the UK to harvest his kidney.
At a sentencing hearing on Friday, Ekweremadu was jailed for nine years and eight months, his wife Beatrice was sentenced to four years and six months imprisonment while Obeta received a 10-year prison term.
The 60-year-old, his wife Beatrice and their 25-year-old daughter Sonia stood trial accused of a conspiracy to bring a kidney donor to Britain from Lagos for his organ.
The couple, along with Obeta, were found guilty in the Old Bailey in March.
The Ekweremadus’ daughter Sonia, who has a serious kidney condition, wept as she was cleared of the same charge.
Justice Johnson told the defendants, “In each of your cases the offence you committed is so serious that neither a fine nor a community sentence can be justified.”
It was alleged that the 21-year-old street trader (kidney donor) was to be rewarded for donating the organ to Sonia in an £80,000 private procedure at London’s Royal Free Hospital.
The case marked the first-time defendants have been convicted under the Modern Slavery Act of an organ harvesting conspiracy.
While it is lawful to donate a kidney, it becomes criminal if money or another material advantage is rewarded.
The prosecution claimed the donor was offered up to £7,000 along with the promise of a better life in the UK.
The donor did not understand until his first appointment with a consultant at the hospital that he was there for a kidney transplant, the Old Bailey was told.
According to the consultant, the donor had a limited understanding of why he was there and was visibly relieved at being told the operation would not go ahead.
It was claimed the man was falsely presented as Sonia Ekweremadu’s cousin in a failed attempt to persuade medics to carry out the procedure at the Royal Free Hospital.
The Ekweremadus had denied the charge against them.
Sonia Ekweremadu, who takes dialysis weekly, declined to give evidence but it was said on her behalf she knew nothing of a reward offered to donors.
During the trial earlier this year, prosecutor Joanne Jakymec called it a horrific plot and said the defendants showed utter disregard for the victim’s welfare, health and wellbeing.
