Court of Appeal in Abuja on Thursday upheld the conviction of Faisal Maina, for conspiracy and money laundering.
Faisal is the son of the former Chairman of the defunct Pension Reformed Taskforce Team, Abdulrasheed Maina.
Faisal was sentenced to 14 years imprisonment by a Federal High Court in Abuja in October.
Faisal who was being prosecuted in a separate three-count money laundering case at the same court had jumped bail and stopped attending trial which had continued sitting in his absence.
The trial court later found Faisal guilty of the charges the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission preferred against him.
The court said that the anti-graft agency was able to establish that Faisal operated a fictitious bank account with the United Bank for Africa through which his father, Maina, laundered the sum of N58.1 million.
The court noted that the said fund which was deposited into the account that was operated in the name of Alhaji Faisal Farm 2, was sequentially withdrawn by the Defendant and his father, between October 2013 and June 2019.
However, in a judgment on Thursday, a three-member panel of the appellate court reduced his term of imprisonment from 14 years to seven years because he is a first-time offender.
Delivering the lead ruling, Justice Ugochukwu Anthony Ogakwu, held that Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court, Abuja was right to have convicted Faisal but ruled that being a first-time offender, the trial court ought not to have handed the convict the maximum punishment under the law.
