AN Abuja Chief Magistrate Court has issued a bench warrant for the arrest of social media influencer Martins Otse, popularly known as VeryDarkMan (VDM).
The order, issued on Thursday, March 13, followed a criminal defamation case brought before the court by a female gospel singer, Mercy Chinwo.
In his ruling, the magistrate, Emmanuel Iyana, directed the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) and other law enforcement agencies to arrest VDM and deliver him before the court at Zone 6 in Abuja to enable him to answer to criminal allegations levelled against him.
The court observed that the defendant ignored a March 5 summons to appear in court.
Despite his lawyer, Deji Adeyanju’s, plea, the judge upheld the arrest order.
Adeyanju had pleaded with the court to allow him to bring his client to court on the next adjourned date.
VDM is accused of posting defamatory comments about Chinwo on his social media page.
VDM allegedly accused Chinwo of being embroiled in a contractual dispute, claiming she diverted $345,000 from her former record label boss, Eezee Tee.
Chinwo, who claimed the allegation damaged her reputation, presented documentary evidence, including emails and payment receipts, to the court to prove her innocence and refute the claims.
The gospel singer’s legal team, led by Pelumi Olajengbesi, demanded that the defendant’s action was contrary to Sections 391 of the Penal Code and Section 24 (1)(B) of the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc.) Act 2015.
In a related development, Chinwo’s lawyers have also filed a N1.1 billion lawsuit against VDM at the Abuja High Court.
The lawyer is seeking a court order to compel VDM to delete and retract the defamatory statements and issue a public apology to Chinwo.
The ICIR reports that VDM is not new to defamation suits. On October 14, a judge, Matthias Dawodu, while ruling on a defamation suit against him by Femi Falana, a senior advocate, and his son, Folarin, popularly known as Falz, held that they possessed legal rights safeguarding them against slander.
The court directed VDM to remove an allegedly defamatory video he posted on September 24 against Falana and his son.
Besides, VDM was restrained from further releasing, publishing, or circulating defamatory content on his social media handles and pages pending the hearing of the suit.
The judge ordered that all processes in the matter be served on VDM through his lawyer, Adeyanju.
The Falanas had initiated separate suits, claiming N500 million each in damages over VDM’s video, alleging he and his son had accepted N10 million from Idris Okuneye (Bobrisky) to compromise justice.
The litigants maintained that VDM knowingly published unverified claims, recklessly injuring their reputation.
A reporter with the ICIR
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