The Lagos State High Court sitting on Thursday, sentenced a banker, Olawale Garuba, to 39 years imprisonment for stealing from the dead.

Garuba was arraigned alongside six others in July 2015 for conspiring among themselves to steal over N30, 000,000 from the bank account of a deceased customer of a bank where the convict works.

Upon their arraignment, they all initially pleaded not guilty to 18 counts of fraud.

However, on June 2, 2016, the convicted banker changed his plea from “not guilty” to “guilty”.

At the trial, Justice Oluwatoyin Ipaye said despite the remorse of the convict, Garuba, she had no sympathy for him as he compromised his position as a banker to steal from a deceased customer whose money would have been used by the family she left behind.

Ipaye stated that the convict allowed his greed to overcome him and risk losing the job that thousands of job seekers are craving to get.

The judge found the banker guilty on 13 of the eighteen counts, and sentenced him to three years imprisonment on each count. The sentences are to run concurrently from the date of his first detention, which is July 24, 2015.