The wife of an esteemed Nigerian politician has been convicted of organ trafficking along with her husband.
Beatrice Ekweremadu, 56, the wife of Ike Ekweremadu, 60, a former deputy president of the Nigerian senate along with a man named Dr. Obinna Obeta, 51 were all found guilty of assisting a young man’s journey to the United Kingdom with the intention of exploiting him following a six-week trial at the Old Bailey, according to a report in The Guardian.
They were also found guilty of conspiring to bring the victim to London to get him to give them his kidney. The 21-year-old man, whose name has been withheld, was offered an unlawful reward to donate a kidney to the senator’s daughter, Sonia Ekweremadu, after she was diagnosed with kidney disease and had to drop out of Newcastle University where she was studying for a master’s degree in film.
When the verdict was announced, she sobbed as her parents were taken away.
In 2022, the man deceived a worker at a private renal unit at the Royal Free Hospital pretending to be Sonia’s cousin in an unsuccessful attempt to persuade medical professionals to conduct an 80,000 euros transplant. A secretary at the hospital served as an Igbo interpreter between the man and the doctors to persuade them that he was an altruistic donor, according to court documents.
During trial, attorney Hugh Davies KC said the Ekweremadus and Obeta regarded the man and other prospective donors as “disposable assets,” treating them merely as “spare parts for reward.” He further said that they engaged in an “emotionally cold commercial transaction” with the man.
Following their conviction, the chief crown prosecutor, Joanne Jakymec, said that “this was a horrific plot to exploit a vulnerable victim by trafficking him to the UK for the purpose of transplanting his kidney.”
She continued: “The convicted defendants showed utter disregard for the victim’s welfare, health and wellbeing and used their considerable influence to a high degree of control throughout, with the victim having limited understanding of what was really going on here.”
